[NetBehaviour] How To Tell If Your Cell Phone Is Bugged.

[marc.garrett at furtherfield.org]

How To Tell If Your Cell Phone Is Bugged.

Lauren Weinstein.

Greetings. A story is making the rounds right now regarding FBI use of cell
phones as remote bugs. I originally wrote about this concept in my PRIVACY
Forum in 1999 ("Cell Phones Become Instant Bugs!") so the issue is real,
but we still need to bring the current saga back down to earth.

This discussion doesn't only relate to "legal" bugs but also to the use of
such techniques by illegal clandestine operations, and applies to
physically unmodified cell phone hardware (not phones that might have had
separate, specialized bugs physically installed within them by third
parties).

There is no magic in cell phones. From a transmitting standpoint, they are
either on or off. It is true that many phones have an alarm feature that
permits them to "wake up" from a seemingly "off" state. However, this is
not a universal functionality, even in advanced phones such as PDA cell
phones, which now often have a "totally off" mode available as well.

It is also true that some phones can be remotely programmed by the carrier
to mask or otherwise change their display and other behaviors in ways that
could be used to fool the unwary user. However, this level of remote
programmability is another feature that is not universal, though most
modern cell phones can be easily programmed with the correct tools if you
have physical access to the phones, even briefly.

But remember -- no magic! When cell phones are transmitting -- even as bugs
-- certain things are going to happen every time that the alert phone user
can often notice.

First, when the phone is operating as a bug, regular calls can't be taking
place in almost all cases. A well designed bug program could try to
minimize the obviousness of this by quickly dropping the bug call if the
phone owner tried to make an outgoing call, or drop the bug connection if
an incoming call tried to ring through. But if the bug is up and running,
that's the only transmission path that is available on the phone at that
time for the vast majority of currently deployed cell phones.

more...
http://lauren.vortex.com/archive/000202.html

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