IRANIANS: Please turn your cell phones off on the street!

برای امنیت بیشتر هنگام تظاهرات موبایل های خود را خاموش کنید

HI there, I just finished talking to my friends in Iran and they told me this

"I recently found out the most important thing that people on the street have to do while they are in street TURN OFF their cell phones. they can easily find them from BTS antena (Its hard to translate!)"

but that's how the government is able to get individuals phone numbers and find them later. Basiji and intelligence police/riot squad are on the top of buildings and in crowds and they are able to figure out who are protest "leaders" and basically use cell phone signals to track them and find out info about the person later on.

Iruniya cell phono khamush bokonin! Ino tuye Farsi Translation forum alan post mikonam

I will be posting more details of this in the Farsi Translation forum, but can someone sticky this too! it's very important

اگر در خیابان نزدیک منطقهي شورش هستید حتما موبایل خود را خاموش کنید.به راحتی می توانند از طریق آنتن های بی تی اس شماره موبایل های موجود در آن منطقه را شناسایی کنند و شماره ها را برای استفاده امنیتی بردارند مسئله جدیست راحتترین و مطمئن ترین راه شناسایی افراد موبایل انهاست!

If you dont want to turn off your cellphone put it on flight mode at least all SonyEricsson mobile I know it ask whe you turn on the phone it ask if you want normal mode or flight mode
In flight mode all function are available it truns off alla radio part of the mobile, It means tha tit is not registered on the basestation. But yu still can take videos

br
former ericsson employee

bump bump bump bump bump

If you don't want to be tracked you have to take the battery OUT. Anything less and they can find a way of tracking you.

wrap cell-phone in aluminum foil

Instead of removing the battery, you can wrap the cell-phone in aluminum foil, or place it any other electrically conductive container. This will block all radio waves.

Don't believe everything you hear: ask your local physics or engineering major for confirmation.

they disable all cell towers in protest zones. turning off cellphone coverage in protest areas is a trick that was also used by the Belarusian authorities to diffuse 2006 protests in Minsk's central square and in the Ukraine during the 'orange revolution'.

put your phone in airplane mode, and you can still take videos/pics without worrying about a visit later from some clownshoes militia secret police. it won't register your number

aluminum foil

aluminum foil was an utterly bad trick. I'm an electromechanic engineer - I know. Don't listen to all advice was probably the only good advice in that post.



[MODEDIT -- i suck c__s]

Re: Taking your battery out

That is a VERY good piece of advice, to the person that suggested that. Even with your phone off, if the battery is still in it, it is still possible to trace your phone, and more! I found this video a while back and was stunned at how this is possible!

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WPt2i24cA5I[/ame]

if you can do flight mode, you should be safe (from them finding your number later) -- but there might be methods for them to discover that "someone has a cellphone" in your area.

then again, most people have cells, so whatever.

like someone else said, talk to someone trusted who knows. if you're outside of a big crowd, it might be best to kill the phone completely unless you need it. I'm not over there, so I don't know the situation.

How long does it really take to boot up your phone? Yes you might lose 2 seconds of pics or videos. Best option is airplane mode. Other than that, turn it off is good enough. Yes, technically some phones (very few) can be remotely accessed when off, but this IS SO UNLIKELY, and serious intel level stuff.

Since it is GSM, some phones can be used to take pictures with no SIM card in. That would be safe. (Technically your IMEI might be advertised, and next time your make a call from your SIM, the two could be linked, but they won't do this).

Also a faraday cage WILL work (solid surround of metal). Aluminum foil might not be thick enough (skin depth issues), but heavy duty aluminum foil a few layers thick should work. Just try leaving it on and calling it while inside the foil.

Not exactly the place for this... but you're doing a good thing, IRH.

Aluminum foil/ Faraday cage

Faraday cages only block signals coming in. They can't be counted on to block any signal from coming out. In other words your phone can still send a signal out from within the aluminum foil. Phone calls don't work because the signal from the tower can't get in, although the tower and authorities can still "see" your phone.

Faraday cages work by allowing charges to move from one side of the cage to the other. When an electromagnetic wave passes from one side of the cage to the other charges(aka electrons) move from one side to the other and counteract the signal. Anything inside the cage sees the additive potential of the moved charges and the external signal. These cancel out and no signal is seen. For this to happen you need a good conductor and aluminum is usually good enough but not nearly as good as copper. Some high frequency signals may still get through aluminum that would be stopped by copper.

Not that this matters, because any signals originating from within the cage and your phone can make it out of the aluminum foil. There is no way to rearrange the charges in the aluminum foil to completely cancel out the signal. This would also be a violation of the conservation of energy. Outside signals pass around the faraday cage so no energy is destroyed

If you have something thick enough you could absorb the signal. This wouldn't violate the conservation of energy because the electromagnetic energy would be converted into heat. But you probably need something very thick.

In conclusion don't rely on aluminum foil, just use airplane mode or remove the battery.

- Your local physics/engineering student.

Everybody talking about all of these complicated solutions....Why not just remove the Sim Card???

چرا فقط سیم کارت را از گوشی در نمیارید؟

Nice epic pwnage guy lol ^

lol I mean that solves the issue, right?? That way they can still use if for the camera.

Ok, you are right about advertising your beacon. And in fact, as I recall your phone might go into high power Tx mode when it can't "see" any tower which means it would be easier to find. I'll have to go review how often GSM advertises it's presence. Though, you are also doing major weird things to the cell phone antenna by wrapping it, in which case it has some odd effective aperture.

just put your phone on FLIGHT MODE... or better still remove the sim card

About SIM cards

Just removing the SIM card on some cell phones might not work, on mine (a RAZR, version BR50) you can only make emergency calls without your card, it will stay locked until you insert it.

(Unless you know some maneuvers to bypass this)

another thing to keep in mind... some phones may store identifying information in exif data of pictures. i don't know how common it is or if any phones do it anymore (about a year ago was the last time i looked for information like that in exif data), but i've seen a few pictures on the internet that include the imei of the phone used to take the picture.

Do they not sell pre-pay disposable SIM cards??? Just don't make any calls or swap SIM when you need to. Let them track a disposable SIM.

Motorola's can be hacked. It's called editting the SEEM and not too difficult on a RAZR. But it's too advanced for this forum.

Code:

 edit SEEM 004A_0001 
offset 4D no bit manipulation, 01 for require sim, 00 for no sim need

google some combo of these words -- motorola seem edit editor razr

Dear iranians

Take out the SIM card, you still can take pictures and videos.

Pass it throught some USB cardes, small and easy to carry... if you can of cause

LONG LIVE FREEDOM

باتري گوشي بايد خارج شود

تا باتري گوشي خارج نشود ، موبايل قابل پيگيري خواهد بود حتي در زمان خاموش بودن آن

But do all phones have sim cards? :/

Why not leave the phones at home, and take a camera instead?

...and leave the phone turned on next to the official Ahmadinejad TV channel.

Then, you have proof that you were sitting at home being their devoted follower.

.

...............................

Iran

هموطن،
احمق ترين مردم كسى است كه از تاريخ درس نگيرد و تاريخ را تكرار كند به اميد گرفتن نتيجه ای جز آنچه گذشتگان گرفته اند.
مردم ما بايد خيلى بى شعور باشند كه دراین موقعیت هدفشان فقط برگرداندن رای موسوى يا هر شخص ديگرى از اين نظام باشد.
الان ديگر با راى دادن نميتوان از شر ديکتاتورى و فاشيسم خلاص شد، الان بايد خون داد براي آزادى و دموكراسى.
آيا شما آمادگى داريد ؟ آيا موسوى يا کروبى يا هر شخص ديگرى كه ادعا دارد حقش تضيیع شده و رايش مخدوش گرديده (كه حتمن هم همينطور است) حاضراند در راه آزادى و دموكراسى و نجات از دست فاشيسم مذهبى و دينى خون دهند ؟
هميشه جريان هاي صادقانه و برگرفته از دل مردم با هدايت هاي غلط ونفوذی به بيراهه رفته و بجاي منتهى شدن به دريا، به باتلاق منتهى شده است.
نگويید كه بايد به تدريج و به صورت نرم انقلاب كرد كه شما هم به احمق هاي تاريخ خواهيد پيوست.
انتخابات، موسوى و کروبى جرقه خوبى بودند تا اين رود خروشان ايجاد شود، ولى مطمئن باشيد كه اینان رهبران خوبى نيستند و نخواهند بود چرا كه خود برآمده و پايبند به اين نظام ديکتاتورى و فاشيستى هستند.
ديکتاتورى و فاشيسم مذهبى هرگز اجازه حركت نرم را نخواهد داد، بلکه فرصت فکر کردن و تدارک بیشتر برای سرکوب به دست دیکتاتورِ خواهد داد. الان كه رود خروشان در جريان است بايد سدها را شكست، نه دلخوش به جويبارى كوچك در آینده ای نامعلوم.َ
الان بیشتر از هر چیز نياز به رهبر و هدايت كننده ای دانا، شجاع، دلسوز، وطن و مردم پرست، آگاه به اصول دموكراسى و پايبند به راى و نظر مردم، داريم.
رهبر نه ديکتاتور خودكامه ای ديگر، بلكه فقط به عنوان مدير و هدايتگراین جريان كه با انتخاب مردم باشد و فقط و فقط با ارده و راي همين مردم در هر زمان قابل ازل يا انتخاب باشد.
آیا شما توان مديريت و رهبري اين جريان را داريد؟ آيا كسى با خصوصيات ذكر شده كه قابل اطمينان نيز باشد را ميشناسيد؟ بيایيد براي یک بار فقط یک بار هم كه شده جدى باشيم و اين حركت را کوچك و حقير نپنداريم و آغازگر راهى نو و نوين باشيم.
بیاييد بدون بازگشت به گذشته براي شروعی جديد، از همينجا قدم برداريم نه اينكه براي رهایى از حال (احمدي نژاد) به 20 سال قبل (موسوى) برگرديم.
امروز بیش از هر روز وقت اتحاد و برابری میباشد. امروز زمان برادری و یکپارچگیست،امروز زمان تصمیم بزرگ و حرکت به سوی آزادی است.
نگذاریم این رود خروشان به تکه جوی های کوچک تقسیم شود که به سرعت خواهد خشکید.
بیاييد نگذاریم این رود خروشان متوقف و یا به بیراهه رود.

پاینده باد ایران و مردم ایران
جارِی و خروشان بادحرکت و پویش ملت ایران
درود بر آزادی
مرگ بر دیکتاتوری و فاشیسم
مرگ بر فاشیسم مذهبی

Has anyone thought about using a digital camera?

hey guys,

it's really funny watching all you guys debating about the physics and telecommunication sciences about mobile phones....but then i thought why can't you take a simple digital camera to the protests to get videos and photos without the hassle of getting caught...just make sure you don't lose your camera or get it taken off you..

come on...and if they do catch you just take the memory card out secretly and say you were testing the resolution of your new camera....i've done that once before in iran...take a spare memory card with you with random photos are there...

On another tecnical note:
Many people think that their e-mails are secure, turth: their not, but here is some software I developed to help with this issue:
*mod edit*

Please stop linking your program everywhere unless you publish the sourcecode so people can compile it themself.

You can on some nokia phones tell it not to send your personal information, making it impossible to see the number, i guess when the person you call (or text message) cant see the number, then my logic tells me that its impossible to find out what the number is. (unless you are dumb enougth to tell them if they ask).

Actually, there is no way to block a phone number from a text message. Whoever told you that was possible has misinformed you. But you can set up your phone to automatically block your phone number...but how does that prevent the government from finding out who you have called? It's still in your phone records, that just prevents the person receiving the call from knowing who you are.

In a protest, do not bring your cell phone, wallet or anything that helps the police figure out who you are. If you want t otake a picture, bring a camera, if you want to talk to someone in the protest, use a walkie-talkie.

The youtube video above describes a way of accessing a phone after it was hacked beforehand.

I not sure whether taking out the SIM card has a real effect here. I think that phones have MAC addresses that they reveal to the tower.

No. The phone still connects to the the mobile tower and identifies itself.

There machines that identify themselves as mobile tower and ask every phone within a mile (I'm not sure about the exact range) to identify themselves by sending a stronger singnal than the real tower.
Those machines are used to get a list of everyone who's in a crowd.

Message tracking

Many operators can track not where your mobile is but have records of the content of every sms/mms/email every person has ever sent or received from their phone (in europe regulations state that at least the sender and recipient must be traceable)

I have heard from a reliable source that this is indeed the case in the Iranian operators, so be careful.

There are almost as many cellphones as peoples in these protests, many eyes to catch and record anything the government does. A much smaller fraction of them have digital cameras. Specially ones you can slide in your pocket and carry around conveniently.

Regardless, carrying a camera in these situations tends to make you a prime target. These days the don't ask questions first.

I spent a week doing work experience with intelligence ops in the RAF, and the access possible to a switched-off cell phone with the battery in is unbelievable. They can read texts etc if the cellphone has the slightest bit of power. Remove the battery if you're unsure or want to cover all bases.

The problem is that cameras are much harder to explain and they won't listen to something like that. It's easier to explain away a phone.

the problem is the Iranian government has controlling interest in every telecom provider inside Iran, and Nokia was contracted to help them install spyware to intercept SMS, record calls and track movement. definitely do not take a cell phone to a protest unless you can pants it while running away they're targeting anybody holding a phone/camera Fed contractor, cell phone maker sold spy system to Iran - Washington Times

Cant people just report their cellphones stolen?