Bluetooth Big Brother uses mobiles and laptops to track thousands of Britons!
LONDON, England - July 22, 2008 - A
Big Brother network of hidden scanners is monitoring hundreds of thousands of
Britons without their knowledge, it emerged yesterday.
Scientists track people walking around cities, using the Bluetooth signals from their mobiles, laptops and handheld computers.
Scanners in bars, offices and universities register nearby Bluetooth devices and send the information to a central database.
The Cityware project, which is funded by £1.2million of taxpayer's money, started in Bath three years ago and is designed to chart how pedestrians use city centers.
It will be used to improve their design, learn how people use public transport and shops and work out how epidemics can spread.
There are thousands of scanners globally, of which 1,000 are actively tracking passers-by at any one time. Three thousand people in Bath were monitored in one weekend alone.
The scientists behind Cityware deny they are intruding on privacy, despite growing concerns over Britain's surveillance society.
They say the signals they get from phones and laptops do not reveal personal information. But critics say the signals can contain the owner's details.
Bluetooth devices use radio signals to communicate with each other.
If Bluetooth is switched on, a gadget will broadcast its name and ID number to anyone within 100 yards.
The name can be changed by the owner and often includes their own name, email address or phone number.
The scanners convert the data into maps showing the movement of people over time.
Bath MP Don Foster said, “This is another infringement of our civil liberties and another step closer to the Big Brother state. We need a guarantee that all data is made anonymous before it is analyzed.”
Simon Davies, of human rights watchdog Privacy International, said, “This could become the CCTV of the mobile industry. It would not take much to make this a surveillance infrastructure over which we have no control.”
Ed. Note: I wonder if George Orwell knew that he was a prophet?
