So, you’re telling me that my neighbor can see the size of my penis while I’m having sex using BFI data from my partner’s phone?
And I could make a 3D image of my neighbor’s breasts using the BFI data from her smart fridge and cell phone, just by listening to this unencrypted BFI data?
Sorry to take the pervert spin, but John Oliver showed us during the Snowden revolutions that if you frame this sort of news in the narrative of “the government is looking at my naked body during sexual exchanges without my consent”, then people will be much more outraged.
Seems like the long term solution to this is to make BFI data encrypted.
If this research gets properly picked up by the press and interpreted and written about from a “the gov can watch you having sex using your smart fridge” then there may be pressure on the WiFi standard to make broadcasting unencrypted BFI illegal in future devices
[…] then there may be pressure on the WiFi standard to make broadcasting unencrypted BFI illegal in future devices
Hahahahahaha, the government wants us only using state approved routers probably to make sure we are all using the one that let them watch us have sex in weird monochrome sonar-vision. We live in a surveillance state more every day and research like this is giving the FBI a fucking hard-on.
They’re using BFI to form 3d images using WiFi radios
Connected devices routinely send information back to the router to help optimize wireless communication. These signals, known as beamforming feedback information (BFI), are transmitted without encryption, meaning that anyone within range can potentially read them.
By analyzing that information, the system can generate images of people from multiple viewpoints. Those images can then be used to determine a person’s identity.
I’ve seen this news many times over the past year. Can I use it in HA yet or not?!
I believe it would require a specific ML model to be trained, due to the slight variances in the hardware and each environment. This means you would also need the hardware to run the model 24/7.
It could definitely be done, and I suspect the fascist surveillance state already has projects to weaponize it; they’re probably also building the capability into the 6G or 7G spec, so they can monitor everything, everyone, everywhere, 24/7 from cell towers alone.
Oh man, that sounds way inefficient. Guess I’ll stick to the human presence sensors, then…
ML models trained for a specific task are not necessarily inefficient. It’d probably be more efficient to add a single pi or container for “sensing” than adding a dozen physical sensors all over the place.
But it also looks like a new wifi standard will include some non-ML sensing capability on router anyway, but probably won’t be available till the 2030’s. I’d expect the ML approach to have solid options within a couple of years.
Because of course we need another dystopian surveillance network to worry about
I wouldn’t be surprised if a convert-to-Mennonite/Amish movement took hold as the veneer of modern life continues to erode
I don’t want to convert to the Amish. But, we are definitely reaching a point where I’d like to revert to… Idk. Late 1990-2000s, maybe early 2010 technology. And ditch all this AI, surveillance bs of the late 2010-2020s!!!
Yep, 08 ish was peak. Now tech is shit.
Idk man, I can play pc games on my phone, and they run really good. Or better yet, PS2 games run like a hot-damn emulated on my phone, so instead of lugging my PS2 everywhere I just put a controller in my bag and I can play Colosseum: Road to Freedom any damn where I want!
True emulation is fun, but soon phones will all be locked down by google/apple, plus they’re total spyware. I’d rather not have them.
Old pixels with graphene will only last so long, new future phones won’t allow it.
Are fairphone locking down their bootloader? Hadn’t heard anything about it
Yeah, I’d love for Linux phones to be actually 100% usable, I’d be gone from android so fast…
I ordered my jolla phone. Let’s hope that’s a better future.
I mean thats great and I love games but not enough to pay for the corpo tracking devices.
New Wave Amish
yeah tech wise kinda peaked before the 20teens. that being said the corpo thing has me wanting to go back to pre computer. eff em. where I am really going is gpl or bust.
There are a few privacy focused standards in the works
Link?
What if I spread mud all over myself?
I don’t think the predator’s visor had a Wi-Fi mode, but who knows.
I know that works against predators, but I don’t think it works against child predators.
It works against mosquitos. I know it’s not the same, but we should treat mosquitos as though they are child predators. Spray with chemicals or splat them.
Made me laugh!
Is it time to put tinfoil in the walls?
Depends. Do you want your WiFi to work outside?
Or you could just disable BFI.
And also switch back to Ethernet, or you’re going to have a hard time getting online.
This but with privacy
I really should get a crimp tool and some snakey bois. Although I use a 4G router. So I could end up with the opposite setup most people have. Wired LAN and wireless internet.
got you beat with all the lead and asbestos in my walls.
It’s been that time
Why all the conditionals in the language? As far as I know “Wifi sensing” is already specified in 802.11bf and will be part of upcoming router generations. There’s no “would” and “could” or “might”? It’s gonna be there. And once it is, it will be used for the one thing it can do, …sense presence of people…
For home assistant, I love it.
But we all know the companies won’t want to keep that information local.
Hello Batman
Tool: “Praying on tidal waves”
Me: “Praying on coronal mass ejections”
this has interesting more info on radio id/imaging
It isn’t clear to me from the article whether a device would need to have connected with any of the wifi networks previously or if the device somehow recognizes the existence of said network and performs some kind of hand shake. This seems important. My devices don’t automatically connect to anything except my home, hidden network, but I would like to know how this works.
The article was very clear that this isn’t fingerprinting your devices. You could have zero devices, but you walk into a café and other people’s devices are all screaming radio waves, including BFI data, which bonuses off your physical body, forming an image of you
That unencrypted BFI data can then be listened-to by a nearby attacker who would process the data in a ML algorithm, and identify you with near 100% accuracy.
That’s what the article said.
