How Not To Be Tracked By Your Cell Phone

This one is for members of The Tin Foil Hat club; long live Big Brother.

It is of course no surprise that cops track cell phones without warrants routinely. It is also no surprise that shopping malls do the same thing (and not just in Australia as it happens here too).

If this scares the bejeezus out of you, there are basically two ways not to be tracked by your cell phone.

Method 1: Periodically turn it off

This is a "duh" solution, but it works.

Do you really need your cell phone on when driving to the local convenience store less than 10 miles away? No, you don’t, so turn your phone off when you’re on the road.

I personally advocate turning your phone off not so much for protection of privacy, but rather just to be safer. For example, driving to any destination with the phone off means you will pay more attention to the road and not your stupid phone.

Method 2: Use a prepaid cell phone bought by someone else

If you give a friend 10 bucks, then instruct him to go buy the cheapest Tracfone at Radio Shack (which is 10 bucks), then give the phone to you, and purposely activate the phone from a payphone, your identity is never "attached" to that phone when you activate it. As long as you always buy your time cards in cash (such as at a Walgreen’s or CVS pharmacy), never register the phone online, never register the phone with any business (online or offline) and only have it turned on when you need to place a call or text someone, your privacy is secured.

This is basically as good as ‘the ultimate privacy’ in cell phones gets. The only way to get more privacy is not to use a cell phone at all.

Method 2a: Use Google Voice or Skype when at home

To keep those pesky Inner Party members from tracking your cell phone, you can further protect your privacy by having the prepaid cell phone off whenever you’re home, and using Google Voice or Skype to place all your outbound calls.

You might be thinking, "But isn’t using Google or Skype just as bad concerning privacy?" That depends on your point of view. Remember, a VoIP call may originate from a specific IP (the one at your home), but the transmission is wired, meaning it’s not being broadcasted over-the-air.