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Smartphone Kill Switch, Consumer Boon Or Way For Government To Brick Your Phone?
MojoKid writes We're often told that having a kill switch in our mobile devices — mostly our smartphones — is a good thing. At a basic level, that's hard to disagree with. If every mobile device had a built-in kill switch, theft would go down — who would waste their time over a device that probably won't work for very long? Here's where the problem lays: It's law enforcement that's pushing so hard for these kill switches. We first learned about this last summer, and this past May, California passed a law that requires smartphone vendors to implement the feature. In practice, if a smartphone has been stolen, or has been somehow compromised, its user or manufacturer would be able to remotely kill off its usability, something that would be reversed once the phone gets back into its rightful owner's hands. However, such functionality should be limited to the device's owner, and no one else. If the owner can disable a phone with nothing but access to a computer or another mobile device, so can Google, Samsung, Microsoft, Nokia or Apple. If the designers of a phone's operating system can brick a phone, guess who else can do the same? Everybody from the NSA to your friendly neighborhood police force, that's who. At most, all they'll need is a convincing argument that they're acting in the interest of "public safety."
We all know our leader are just aiming to our best... don't they ?
Why should THE MAN want to brick your phone, when instead they can just track you - that's what they want - then they can brick *you* as needed.
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If bricking a phone would also result in any stored photographs going "bye bye".... I can think of quite a few police who would like that feature.
If the owner can disable a phone with nothing but access to a computer or another mobile device, so can Google, Samsung, Microsoft, Nokia or Apple.
Not necessarily true... It's entirely possible that you could implement this by encrypting a lock/unlock token with a key known only to the user. Google/Samsung/MS/Nokia/Apple would be no more capable of generating such a token than anyone else.
If you can un-brick the phone after it has been bricked, I'm sure someone will figure out a way to do this without involving the official channels. Theft might go down for a while, and it might never be as high as it once was, but once someone figures out how to un-brick the phone, steeling a phone will still get you something, even if you have to use it on another network or another country. Think blocking the IMEI is going to do it? There are already methods of changing or spoofing IMEI codes on lots of phones. This will stop casual theft, but like most locks, it won't deter determined thieves.
>"Here's where the problem lays: It's law enforcement that's pushing so hard for these kill switches. "
Yeah, like I have been warning people for years anytime the topic comes up. Government misuse. Security nightmare when it gets hacked. Etc. They just say I am paranoid or "tin foil" or whatnot.
I guess I can remind them about my warnings over the last decade about the fed and big business spying on USA citizens. I am amazed at how little most people care about privacy/freedom.
Now, let me get back to reading this letter I got from State Farm today explaining how wonderful it will be to save "up to 5%" on my State Farm car insurance if I am willing to plug in a device that constantly tracks my braking, acceleration, turns, speed, distance, and location.
Let's hope that the logic to brick is in some piece of code that can be subverted via a custom OS build and not something close to the radio receiver.
Also: I will laugh really hard as soon as the blackhats release a tool to bypass security and auto-brick, and then someone heads to the nearest mall on a Saturday with a high-power radio.
While I actually agree that this type of feature SHOULD exist I think it is better implemented at the Operator level by them implementing IMEI blocking like every other major carrier around the world. This "kill switch" sounds like a huge target for hackers as all they need to do is break down one wall and they have access to everyones phones kill switch. Much like when China and other Rogue states infiltrated Gmail and other mail carriers years ago it wasnt through the front door but the secret back door that the Govt had installed.
It's actually All of the Above (tm).
It's a way for you to turn off and disable a stolen phone.
And it's a quick way for the Thought Police to turn off all cell phones which take nasty pics and vids and audio when they go all East Germany Stasi on your First Amendment and other rights.
By the way, in case you didn't know, even when they "turn off" wireless and cell node tracers in urban centers that could track your cell phone, they can always turn them back on with 5 minutes. So those cities that "removed" them but never physically removed them still have them enabled for crackdowns on anyone who thinks they actually have rights.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
My motto's always been 'always purchase a mobile phone that can be thrown, hard, at an annoying client's head and still function afterwards'.
In fact my current brick-like antique Nokia doesn't have a kill-switch, but it can certainly be used as one.
How long until carriers start strong-arming consumers to allow them to brick the phone at the end of the contract? Perhaps at first they'll offer a discount incentive?
when they can just have your cell company shut down you service.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
The next step will be a modification to the "stingray" fake cell site unit to brick all phones in an area and prevent uploading of audio or video. This will be used during demonstrations.
EBay. What if the seller I bought the phone from didn't like the negative feedback I left him for the phone not being described correctly and decided to be a dick and brick my phone? Giving owners that capability effectively kills much of the second and third hand market.
Is that a roll of dimes in your pocket or are you happy to see me?
As in any good police state, if the police does not like you, the relevant US police force will just shoot you in your home and either claim they had the wrong address, or place some drugs or hints of terror-support. Bricking phones is for children.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
Sure, and there are no other radio technologies. Or fibers. Or wires. Or lasers.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
.
Why would anyone think that governments would show the least bit of hesitation to brick smartphones under similar circumstances?
Blanket bricking of cell phones, or selective bricking of those of "ringleaders", is an inevitable problem for the most peaceful and well behaved political rally with this kind of technology in government hands. Remember the "Arab Sping", and Tianenmen Square, and even the more recent and quite peaceful "Occupy Wall Street" protests.in the US, and understand exactly why and how law enforcement want this kind of power.
I don't know. I have had zero phones stolen in my lifetime, but I am becoming increasingly interested in attending protests...
Supporter of the +1 Over Dramatic mod option. In memory of apk.
This is nothing but FUD. The Guv'munt can already listen in through the microphone, read everything sent through and stored on your phone, and even use your body as an antennae to connect wireless to a nearby device. "Oh but what if the government bricks my phone!!" Stop living in fear. They can already do much worse. I'm not normally a fan of giving Law Enforcement what it wants, but in this case, their intentions are pure (ish). They don't want to have to spend time chasing down peoples stolen phones. It's the bulk of their time these days, they have better things to do. You don't want there to be an incentive for people to steal your phone. It's a simple matter to disallow a certain phone's ID from a network. The fact that phone companies haven't done this themselves already is the real crime here.
The US can now brick aspects of your phone and track your phone. Still powered on and seems to work but just cant upload in a city that night.
The more a person wants to upload, the more interesting the user is.
Let voice only work to see if any unlisted friends are called in real time for much needed tech help, if the media captured is described.
A person cannot upload, but the phone still seems to work and is very trackable. A gov could then send some new software down too?
Hoping a person of interest would not give up on their still working phone over weeks, months when upload ability is restored soon after.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
Yes...this will be the best way to stop criminals...especially IP thieves and copyright violators. Just brick everyone in the bit torrent swarm by court order. The next step is to extend this to all computing devices...AMD and Intel and homeland security can come up with a bricking standard that runs in like ring negative three :)
Re "I stop to wonder how many smartphones worldwide are already 'kill-chipped' in such a manner by US Intelligence Community and others already." :)
In other nations its just a nice, helpful, free telco feature stopping a working phone after its been lost.... built in as sold
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
You know that's not why they are mandating it, right?
Who actually wants a kill switch? Anyone on /. at all?
This anti-feature will be used by not just government but any suffiently motivated hackers to kill your communications. The one ostensible benefit mentioned here is anti-theft, but of course that relies on the mechanism working reliably in the first place and secondly not being circumvented by a thief five minutes after they have acquired it.
Just like the idiotic remote car immobilisers that people who should know better are so quick to adopt. Just wait until some hacker gets the code to your car and holds it to ransom or worse, immobilises it on a freeway. What about when overzealous local law enforcement decides to immobilise all cars exceeding the limit by 1%.
"Nine times out of ten, starting a fire is not the best way to solve the problem." - my wife
In OZ, the carriers block at the IMEI level, so if a phone is stolen you can't use it in Australia (unless you can change the IMEI to one that the carriers recognise as valid)
http://www.lost.amta.org.au/
Why doen't the USA do this as a sterting point?
46137
God forbid America implement a feature that already exists in the rest of the world and has worked perfectly for many many years. Clearly copying a working implementation from some other country will doom all citizens. We don't need that "public safety" thing.
You don't need a kill switch built in to the phone. You just cut the service off at the carrier.
The capability already exists.
All this paranoia about "Oh no, the government could silence me when I'm at a protest!". They could already do it if they wanted to.
They could ask your carrier to cut off your network access. You'd be restricted to WiFi.
If a kill switch was built in to the phone but you've taken out your SIM and only used WiFi, they wouldn't have access to the kill switch.
If you're paranoid, there is no difference.
It's about control. Why else would the government mandate it?
Taking guns away from the 99% gives the 1% 100% of the power.
I know that Apple introduced that feature with iOS 7 and the number of robberies of iPhones dropped dramatically thereafter...which was the point of it and a really nice thing to see.
However, this angle on things, which I hadn't thought of, is totally on target - this is totally ripe for abuse by the NSA etc. when the correct number comes up..political or otherwise. Remember we have seen one of these agencies erase information that the Senate was looking at to audit them with, then that agencies leader lies under oath about it - then doesn't get punished in the slightest for it afterwards.
At this point, Joe public wouldn't need to worry about it, but we need to have things set for when stuff gets bad (when the wrong President gets into power and knows how to use all that intelligence offense he has behind a military official whose only oath is to his orders) and things go to a police state for political gain (as it always is)...then this becomes a terrible thing and not worth having.
The Twilight Zone episode: https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
Mobile phones are easy triggers. They just want a way to blanket turn off if they have security recording of a terrorist buying x brand phone at y store.
Enabling a kill switch is not really creating a new kill switch... It's simply giving you, the purchaser, the right to tell the phone company to block the IMEI using the same tools that law enforcement does now. It literally costs them nothing to allow, since it already exists, but, as noted in the Summary, will result in a huge drop in the number of re-purchased phones after theft/breakage... phones that are frequently re-purchased at full price, due to the multi-year contract lock-ins. This is all about money, not freedom.
. . . if you're that paranoid.
I think that if we had to fix this, as though it's a problem, we could just create a way that the phone could have the ability to not be bricked for... what an hour or so (perhaps this feature could have it's own timer set by the user), with the same password or whatever they come up with to unbrick it later. So if you're at the place that you're using your phone and the $government wants to brick the phone, you could enter the code and the phone can then not be bricked for so long.
If your phone is bricked, but it's in your hand, is that such a bad thing, as long as there's a way to unbrick it, rather fast, and then disable it from being bricked (for a certain time period)? If the $government wants the phones to be bricked, and their reasoning is for the good of the general public, then I cannot see why it wouldn't be done in this way, in order to please everyone.
Or am I overlooking something?
Politics; n. : A religion whereby man is god.
It gets depressing to think that even a device we purchase that we think is our own, someone wants to control under a BS law. We have no power or control over almost anything anymore (our homes, our cars, our music, our movies, nothing).
It isn't enough to simply look at the world as is. You must consider the world with universal deployment of kill switches and fully understand likely consequences as much as possible.
Stolen phones can be taken apart and sold for parts... Thieves doing this may well end up making more money than phone as a whole can be sold in an underground market.
If users have ability to opt-out then anyone taking phones by force could demand victim "opt out" putting owner in increased risk of harm v. lift 'n dash encounter lasting seconds. Further thieves could demand credentials to your online account linked to the phone and lock you out of it.
As they say "the road to hell is paved with good intentions"..
There are technical solutions that could work such as a "fused" opt-in where physical device can never be opted out after an opt-in without mainboard replacement or some kind of secondary duress password to covertly signal theft... yet it seems obvious nobody is going to implement fuses and secondary passwords.
The argument that calling the carrier/police is not enough seems to hinge exclusively on the notion of phones sold overseas out of reach of carriers...
This as far as I can see means anything that would actually work while not putting victim at increased risk is also by necessity as oppressive as hell. Users should NOT have the means to lock their devices themselves as it puts them at increased risk of harm and to be effective it must either work OOB of both normal cell network/IP Internet or implement a heartbeat/watchdog with a central server to continuously prove continued availability which is one massive single point of disaster.
The OOB signal could be some kind of special backhauled PDP anchored to US carrier? I don't know enough to even guess how it might be implemented or if it is even possible.
As most technical solutions to political and or social problem I'm drawing a blank imagining a scenario whereby kill switches make a positive contribution to the world.
If people really want to cut down on theft maybe they should use common sense when wielding expensive toys in public.... or ... ah... gulp... um... ... a... device vendors could always .... ...u... know... make them cost less.
If the state wants to cut off your mobile phone access they don't need to brick your phone they just ask your carrier to turn off your services.
First its raging against the "Walled Garden" App store, now it's "we don't need no anti-theft kill switch".
Well maybe you don't, my techno friend, but you're in the minority.
The majority of smart phone users do want a device that they
a) can safely install non-trojan software from a verified & reviewed source
b) not be mugged for carrying an expensive toy
They can already brick your phone today.
Mr. Phone, meet Mr. Brick. *smash*
You know that's not why they are mandating it, right?
Never stopped them before.
Why Law Enforcement in California pushed for the law was that there is a real problem with violent smartphone robberies. The victim steps away from her friends to talk on her smartphone. The thief hits her from the back so she falls forward grabbing her phone and runs. She would not see who the thief was. This is an every weekend occurrence in San Francisco and the San Francisco Police don't like this. A kill switch would make smartphone theft less profitable.
What is going on is the governemnt/police want a way to turn off phones when protests are going on. They don't want protestors to communicate. My guess is they know that people are going to be getting sick of the bullshit the government/police pull and will start protesting more.
Be seeing you...
So you go to McDonalds and upload the video there.
The point is mass remote bricking stops not just communication, but terminates recording devices En Masse. How many people still carry a separate camera with them...
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
The government is much more interested in listening in, than stopping you from using your device.
They'll snatch the phone off the person (gathering evidence for their investigation) and the video or the phone will mysteriously disappear.
No it will not because most photos and video syncs to a network service now, and the police know this (mostly).
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
It's a way for mass bricking of phones should the need arise. And people will just accept it, believing it's for their own good.
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
Why would the NSA or the police want to brick someone's phone? All that would achieve is a minor annoyance for the target, who would promptly go out and buy another cheap burner phone. The needs of NSA/police are much better served by keeping the phone online and monitoring it.
Vendors on the other hand, have a vested interest in shutting down old phones to make you buy a new one.
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Its unacceptable if any third party controls it. If I buy the phone and its mine... then I am the ONLY one that should be able to brick it.
Something we should push for at some level is physical access to the ROM on these smartphones. The "drives" or "disks" used to store whatever. They only get away with this protected bootloader crap because we can't just pull the drive out, pop it into another machine, overwrite it with what we want, and then reinsert it.
How impractical would it be if the phones for example had no "chip" that stored the firmware but rather everything was stored on a micro SD card in the guts of the phone. If it worked that way you could take a screw driver to the phone, pop the microsd card out, and get complete write access to the whole thing.
why not.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
Since several posts have mentioned shutting down areas, I thought I'd bring this back up. Let's not let this shit happen again.
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/...
Just another day in Paradise
as we all know, phone's aren't just phones anymore. They are both video and still cameras. The issue should be re-phrased as 'Should we let the government/police/etc have the ability to disable all cameras and recording devices in an area at will?'
Disabling the wireless tower in Ferguson would kill the twitter and livestream feeds, but people would still be capturing all the events on their cameras, er, i mean phones, which would have found it's way out to the world later regardless. If every camera (or the great majority of cameras) were bricked... well.. maybe not quite so much.
How about having anti-kill 'locations' that the phone has to be near every so often to keep working? In other words, if my phone hasn't been near locations I secretly choose for over a week/month/quarter, the phone stops working. That helps with the theft issue without allowing third parties to externally brick your phone.
This posting serves as proof that I thought of this first! I might just file a patent.
Tiller's Rule: Never use a word in written form that you've only heard and never read. You will end up looking foolish.
No one steals phones to use "the phone" with a new sim. Well, some people do, but they are a tiny tiny minority. The real value is stealing electronics is boxing them up and selling them by the kilo to "resource extractors" for the money. No one who makes this a side business gives a crap about your bricked phone.
Phones, depending on type and the resources in them, have a per kilo value. Like anything, it's volume volume volume.
This is totally about law enforcement stopping free communication. It will not stop theft in the slightest. Anyone telling you this has some deterrant about theft is an idiot at best and lying at worst.
I'm a satanic clam.
If you don't think the NSA can't call up and convince Verizon to do so, you are more a fool.
They can also call up Verizon and instantly turn off any particular cell tower - or all in a single city.
Other countries have done such things before.
This is not significantly added power to the NSA or to Verizon.
excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com
I would be less concerned about the government doing this (because there are consequences to doing so -- the Streisand effect being one) than random script kiddies exploiting a vulnerability in the kill switch mechanism by sending a signal to every phone passing a certain point on the highway, for example, just because they can. Given that the government is pushing for this, you know it's going to be somewhat standardized (they wouldn't want to have to use a different process for Apple, Samsung, etc. phones) and so that standard code is going to be a prime target for attackers.
If this does happen, I give it a week or less before the system is compromised and someone starts using it for "entertainment" purposes.
You're both being silly. Roads, including PAVED roads, have existed for THOUSANDS OF YEARS.
Appius Claudius Caecus, a government official in Rome, commissioned the Via Appia (Appian Way) over two thousand years ago, but thousands of years before that there was a road to Bethhoron. Consider also:
Then they said, Behold, there is a feast of the LORD in Shiloh yearly in a place which is on the north side of Bethel, on the east side of the highway that goeth up from Bethel to Shechem, and on the south of Lebonah.
Judges 21:19
As marauders lie in ambush for a victim, so do bands of priests; they murder on the road to Shechem, carrying out their wicked schemes.
Hosea 6:9
Raise your hand if you know all about Canaanite infrastructure projects in the third millennium BC. I'm going to venture a guess that neither of you have any idea how the roads in Horeb were built.
Those would be early examples of _improved_ roads. Roads, as named routes, existed in the stone age. Which one of you is going to claim you were at the tribal council meeting in Grog's cave 14,000 years ago to witness the road improvement project being contracted out to Ork?
Or rather lack thereof.
Right now I can walk into a T-Mobile store, buy an iPhone with cash, pay the first month with cash, and get a burner smartphone with a data plan. No ID, no name, no address, no credit check.
If this law is implemented, the ability to buy a smartphone anonymously goes away. You'll have to show an ID. For this law. How else will they know whether you're the person who can request that that phone be bricked?
This isn't about theft, the police don't give a shit about theft. If you don't believe that, try reporting one. This is about removing the anonymity of burner phones.
The cell phone has become one's safety line to all assistance. If they were bricked, no one could use them for any purpose. The safety line MUST exist, congress mandated it. The phone should be able to call for help or assistance in some reasonable way, like 911 or call home, etc.
Yep totally agree that because the Govt might be able to brick your phone the ability to lower theft rates should be withheld from the populace.
Of course bricking your phone makes it much harder for them to listen to your phone calls but needs must.
Oh sorry /sarcasm
Wolja Future Tombstone: Shit happened then I died
Based on the govt's track record with the unconstitutional Do Not Fly list, does anyone doubt that the Feds would define a class of people "not entitled to communicate" via an unchallengeable and undiscoveraple device bricking list? "They can use the postal system," would be the rationalization.
There is no way to block abuse of any Off Switch technology. It must be opposed ruthlessly NOW!