Defense contractor Leonardo is promoting a new technology called SignalTrace that will package plate cameras with sensors that can scrape unique identifiers tied to your smart devices and make that data available to law enforcement.

Police, border security, and other government agencies already comprise Leonardo’s customer base, and with this technology, those clients seek to correlate footage from these cameras to phones, tablets, wearables, AirTags, and, naturally, the electronics inside cars themselves.

If SignalTrace can pick up your Bluetooth headphones, you can be sure it’ll also be looking out for your vehicle’s 5G hotspot, infotainment system, and even its tire pressure monitoring sensors. The company includes pet microchips as a potential entry point to tracking.

  • @tristynalxander@mander.xyz
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    233 hours ago

    If police can do this to normal citizens, normal citizens should be allowed to do this to the police. If they have nothing to hide, why would it be a problem?

    • Kairos
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      146 minutes ago

      Normal citizens can do this to police.

  • EbbyA
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    53 hours ago

    I’d be a shame if someone hid an ESP32 nearby randomly broadcasting previously detected MAC addresses.

    • @batmaniam@lemmy.world
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      128 minutes ago

      Despite doing an awful lot with ESP32s, Home assistant, and a bunch of LoRa stuff, I know very little about BLE. Would it be possible for folks to voluntarily add their MAC to a data base on gitlab, and have a ESP32 program that:

      1. Spammed out whatever the max reasonable number of random entries from that database is
      2. Updated it every-time it was on a specified WiFi So that every time I drove by one of these, not only do I look like a spacehulk of TPS, headphones, cars and cellphones, but I’m specifically helping someone appear somewhere not their location as well?
  • Carmakazi
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    877 hours ago

    How many criminals are taking along their microchipped pets to and from their crimes?

    Rhetorical question I know. They simply do not want to allow dissidents and undesirables the freedom of movement.

    Also, if you contribute to a project like this, you are a traitor and should be treated as such.

  • [deleted]
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    356 hours ago

    If they track all that other stuff then they are not ‘license plate cameras’.

  • @Bluedragon012@lemmy.world
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    33 hours ago

    Kill the rich, save the poor. Taxation, is not enough for the current era. There must be justice for the crimes committed. Once they are dead, then we can figure out how to run the world without capitalism. Untill then, the elimination of the ultra-rich by any means should be the goal. Everything else is noise.

    In addition: We have the power. The US power grid is fragile. As such if we all turn off our power at the exact same time, we can cripple the grid. On July 4th at 11pm cst exactly, we can all power down our homes. Even if only 50% do it, it will enough. We have the power, and we will stop these monsters by any means necessary!

  • @Warl0k3@lemmy.world
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    6 hours ago

    … pet microchips are passive LF RFID tags, they have a readable range of maybe 15cm? Unless they’ve figured out some way to power them at distance (or they’re sticking UHF tags in your dogs, which they arent) without frying the camera and giving everyone cancer, they’re inert. What weird marketing hype.

      • @Warl0k3@lemmy.world
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        5 hours ago

        For unimplanted tags of unspecified size sure it’s technically possible to do, but I’ll let the article summarize why this is blatant marketing hype:

        The ideal lab setup often fails miserably once you mount the reader near a gate or machine frame.

        It’s worth saying: 1 meter is an ambitious goal for 125kHz. LF systems are intentionally short-range to prevent cross-talk. If you truly need 1-meter coverage, sometimes the real solution isn’t to push more current — it’s to rethink geometry, use multi-coil zones, or explore hybrid systems (LF for identity, HF/UHF for distance).

        and then mention that the interference from the dermis vastly reduces the useful range of the tags, and that the article doesn’t actually specify what type of tag they’re designing for (or if it’s using a set orientation…).

  • @extremeboredom@lemmy.world
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    166 hours ago

    Maybe time to start creating devices that spam various Bluetooth MACs and just leave them around… Raise the noise floor a bit

    • @frongt@lemmy.zip
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      145 hours ago

      Nah, too easy to filter. Make them clone MACs they’ve seen, and simulate trips around the city.

        • @FauxLiving@lemmy.world
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          237 minutes ago

          Small single board computer with a solar battery could spam fake bluetooth MACs all day and night. You would need additional hardware to fake the 4G signals (and this would be illegal) or things in the unlicensed bands like tire pressure monitor sensors.

          Your setup would cost about as much as theirs and they have infinity money, so absent some rich sponsor you’d be limited to screwing with a few nodes. A more effective use of battery power would be an angle grinder (this would also be illegal).

  • @minorkeys@sh.itjust.works
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    5 hours ago

    The more of you that is digital, the more of you they will see. Their ignorance of your life is a critical protection for you, from them.

  • fleem
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    146 hours ago

    ghost in the shell laughing man shit.

    a couple years go by and they don’t know how to track people regularly anymore.

    so if we bypass these sensors and algorithms, we become invisible in plain sight

  • @skozzii@lemmy.ca
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    45 hours ago

    This AI bubble is gonna crash so hard, none of this processing is sustainable and profitable.

  • @wasabi_noir@lemmy.zip
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    45 hours ago

    I hope for a horrible end for whatever piece of shit decided to track pets. A curb stomping would be too kind for that kind of trash.