Cell phones have GPS... right?

[corrado33]

So I thought to myself the other day... "Don't cell phones have GPS chips inside of them?"  I'm pretty sure newer ones do, especially the ones that give you turn by turn directions.  Has anyone every tried to scavenge a GPS chip from a phone?

[Admin]

The law in the US states that a percentage of all phones (I think like half, can't remember) produced by manufacturers must have built in GPS.

It doesn't state the required accuracy, to my knowledge, which I suspect to be pretty bad.

Remember it'll be surface mount, so you'd still need a PCB to use it . . .

[dunk]

The law in the US states that a percentage of all phones (I think like half, can't remember) produced by manufacturers must have built in GPS.

It doesn't state the required accuracy, to my knowledge, which I suspect to be pretty bad.

Remember it'll be surface mount, so you'd still need a PCB to use it . . .

hahaha.
have they run out of things to legislate?

if you want a burst of paranoia, it is also a legal requirement to be able to provide the government with unencrypted output on any communications equipment sold in the US.
this means all communications equipment sold over the counter in the states are vulnerable to "man in the middle" attacks as end to end encryption is illegal.

it's things like this that hold back the US telecommunications industry, having to reverse engineer "features" to fit in with legislation.
the US cell phone adoption rate was is only now reaching the rate in the rest of the western world.
what new technology will fall into the same trap?


dunk.

[Admin]

The logic was that GPS coordinates would be very useful for emergency responders, in case you called 911, or if you went missing, or if you become a wanted criminal.

I do believe the authorities require a warrant to get the information from a phone carrier, but in practice I believe that carriers just pass the information along without any warrants upon request.

[Soeren]

Hi,

It doesn't state the required accuracy, to my knowledge, which I suspect to be pretty bad.

Nokia uses (at least with some of their GPS enabled phones) a combination of GPS and the cell net antennas to get pretty accurate results.

Google gives away "maps" for free for their phone and this has forced Nokia to do likewise - the future looks bright for the consumer that doesn't mind if the government can track each second of your life.

The French intelligence has been evesdropping on cell phones in DK and the rest of, at least Western, Europe for years, so you shouldn't be too paranoid to use a cell phone to begin with.

[Admin]

<off topic>
Here we go:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/18/washington/18nsa.html

And before we blame Bush, Obama has already stated he will continue the policy of tapping phones without warrants. Email companies also pass along information to the authorities without a warrant (Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft). So paranoia won't help, you're already screwed
</off topic>

That said, lets get back on the subject of hacking GPS within phones!

[TrickyNekro]

So in the US it would be illegal to use a wifi router with a long enough password that not an average super computer can break??? LOL?!?!

I recall some guys here in my uni trying to break WEP encryption.... They used 4 graphic cards in SLI just to get the code...
And it was only 64bit long....

Anyways back to the topic...
Why to salvage an IC (which may be more than one) then try building a board... and even worse try to solder or desolder it... when... you can simply "talk" to the phone...

Most phones give access with some kind of serial port... I don't know what happens of course with new ones and if a serial pin is available on the inside...
Instead... why not bluetooth?!?! Most phones if not all today have bluetooth build in... And bluetooth... is serial communication... but wireless... ;-)

[Soeren]

Hi,


Or buy a cheap bluetooth- or USB GPS "mouse".
Removing and reusing a chip from a modern telephone sound like a lot of wasted time with a real possibility for damaging the chips, trouble finding datasheets etc.

[corrado33]

I was just postulating it, I never actually thought I'd put it into use!    I agree it'd be much easier to "talk" with the phone, but then you'd have to worry about phone battery life etc etc.  I just thought it was a neat idea.

[TrickyNekro]

You can actually power a cell phone with a regulated supply... that's no issue...