this post was submitted on 06 Oct 2023
50 points (98.1% liked)
Technology
59414 readers
2767 users here now
This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
Our Rules
- Follow the lemmy.world rules.
- Only tech related content.
- Be excellent to each another!
- Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
- Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
- Politics threads may be removed.
- No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
- Only approved bots from the list below, to ask if your bot can be added please contact us.
- Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed
Approved Bots
founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
Network is more effective IMO, as you don't specifically need GPS to get someone's location. You can use nearby WiFi MAC address lookups, bluetooth beacons, cell towers, or plain old IP lookup if there's internet etc.
Yeah, but it also makes the device a lot less useful unless you're by wifi, and then the triangulation will basically show where you were up to the point you dropped off-network. I already turn off location in software until it's needed - mostly for battery concerns but also some privacy - so having a hard switch would be much more convenient. Tower would still be able to triangulate but accuracy on that can be pretty variable.
IP lookups are kinda useless for GeoIP on phones. Mine shows a location thousands of km away where my provider terminates connections, and they're shared IP's.