Re: home screen icon to connect to wi-fi network

Enrico Papaloma <enrico@papaloma.net> wrote:

On 9/22/2024 8:29 AM, Chris wrote:

Worse, if you have more than one home access point, your phone broadcast
the unique 96-character BSSID of every one of your home access points.

 
Your phone will broadcast *all* WAPs that you've ever connected to (and not
removed). There's no way for the shop - even if they cared - to identify
which WAP is your home one. Even if they had a global database look-up of
all BSSIDs and geographical addresses. With the exception of if you only
ever connect to a single WAP which is your home.

 

[snip]

So we can safely assume your unique BSSID & GPS location is already easily
accessible by any person who knows how to access that public database.

And exactly who can access this "public" database?

People can also see my house on google maps or see my address in the phone
book. Certain officials can also get my name and address for official
reasons, like electioneering.

And, we can just as safely assume that my unique BSSID is NOT in that db.

Maybe, maybe not. How would you even know?

Regardless, neither your house nor your address is secret information.

Do we agree on that as a basic starting point.
a. Your unique BSSID is in the public database as is your GPS location.
b. Mine is not.
 
That's just a basic starting point, but do we at least agree on that yet?

Possibly, but you've completely missed my point. Your BSSID doesn't
intrinsically identify you and given any broadcast includes all WAPs it's
impractical/impossible to identify your home (or mine) from a device's
broadcast.

At best, all someone can do is say that your device has been seen on this
network before. They won't be able to say that this device belongs to Arlen
who lives at 123 Acacia Avenue. A specialist with legal authority and a lot
more information gathered from elsewhere *might*.