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Comment by mensetmanusman | Hacker News Reader

So this is why the government will never force Apple to have easy to remove batteries.

Why would they waste their time on Bluetooth tracking when your location pings cell towers and WiFi hotspots?

Perhaps because the bluetooth tracking is a lot more accurate. But since not even Apple can access the data (or so they claim), this shouldn’t be useful for surveillance.

Exactly. All mass surveillance request go straight to Google thanks to their unencrypted location tracking.

What unencrypted location tracking does this comment refer to?

https://support.google.com/accounts/answer/3118687?hl=en

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28553778

Bluetooth tracking is noisy and a waste of time for external actors because you can't match it other data points.

Not sure I agree here. Most Bluetooth Low Energy devices (aside from Apple Devices and Android phones) don't make use the privacy feature and therefore their device address can be linked to a specific product. Many Bluetooth products have user accounts attached to them (think fitness trackers and AirTag-like products) meaning that the device address can be tied to a specific user.

Now consider the vast number of “smart nodes” out there (eg street lights) that have multi-protocol connectivity built into them. Whoever controls these nodes can simply scan and log every BLE advertisement that is nearby.

I’m not saying that this is the only way that a person can tracked or that this kind of tracking is definitely happening right now, but it’s a very real possibility.

Bluetooth tracking kinda sucks unless you’re literally apple or have beacons everywhere somehow. It really just gives proximity to a known location.

UWB and Cell tower tracking are much more accurate for the majority of real-world applications

> So this is why the government will never force Apple to have easy to remove batteries.

The government did not force Apple to use non-user-replacable* batteries. Which is good, unless you're a fan of government-designed hardware and software.

(*Well, not easily user replaceable: https://www.ifixit.com/Guide/iPhone+12+Battery+Replacement/1...)

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