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Comment by alufers | Hacker News Reader

You would get a lot of false positives, meaning apps that legitimately need the location. For example navigation apps or unfortunately apps on Android which use Bluetooth.

This really annoys me, because the dialog looks the same for apps that want to use GPS data and apps that use Bluetooth, and there is no way to grant just Bluetooth permissions.

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This is fixed in Android 12, BLE and Location are properly disconnected now. The permission dialogue reads “determine relative position of nearby devices” if you request BLE access.

You can also declare that your app “never needs physical location”, which excludes BLE beacons that could be used for that purpose from the data the app receives.

https://developer.android.com/guide/topics/connectivity/blue...

The problem, and one of the reason those permissions were together, is that BLE by itself is enough to get your coarse location, like WiFi is. If you are offline but can detect the bluetooth device A and B, and another internet device can see the devices A and C, then it's ease to conclude that you, the internet device, as well as the devices A, B and C are all in vicinity of each other. It's good that the precise location permissions are separate from Bluetooth permissions, but people need to understand this.

And what do we do with apps which have a legitimate reason to use your location, then proceed to sale your location history to third parties? No confirmation dialog can save us from that.

Yes, and the same goes for information about the WiFi network. Lots of apps for IoT devices require this information to set up products, but the OS presents this as location tracking.

Well, that's because scanning for WiFi networks and Bluetooth devices nearby effectively reveals your location.

It might still make sense to split these permissions, but it should be clear that you're giving up your location.

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