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How do these people get information legally from your private phone to do this study? Using Facebook and your phone's GPS? Anyone have thoughts on this? What are other countries doing?

Abstract Since early March 2020, the COVID-19 epidemic across the United Kingdom has led to a range of social distancing policies, which resulted in changes to mobility across different regions. An understanding of how these policies impacted travel patterns over time and at different spatial scales is important for designing effective strategies, future pandemic planning and in providing broader insights on the population geography of the country.

Crowd level data on mobile phone usage can be used as a proxy for population mobility patterns and provide a way of quantifying in near-real time the impact of social distancing measures on changes in mobility. Here we explore patterns of change in densities, domestic and international flows and co-location of Facebook users in the UK from March 2020 to March 2021.

We find substantial heterogeneities across time and region, with large changes observed compared to pre-pandemic patterns. The impacts of periods of lockdown on distances travelled and flow volumes are evident, with each showing variations, but some significant reductions in co-location rates. Clear differences in multiple metrics of mobility are seen in central London compared to the rest of the UK, with each of Scotland,

Wales and Northern Ireland showing significant deviations from England at times. Moreover, the impacts of rapid changes in rules on international travel to and from the UK are seen in substantial fluctuations in traveller volumes by destination. While questions remain about the representativeness of the Facebook data, previous studies have shown strong correspondence with census-based data and alternative mobility measures, suggesting that findings here are valuable for guiding strategies.

How do these people get information legally from your private phone to do this study? Using Facebook and your phone's GPS? Anyone have thoughts on this? What are other countries doing? Abstract Since early March 2020, the COVID-19 epidemic across the United Kingdom has led to a range of social distancing policies, which resulted in changes to mobility across different regions. An understanding of how these policies impacted travel patterns over time and at different spatial scales is important for designing effective strategies, future pandemic planning and in providing broader insights on the population geography of the country. Crowd level data on mobile phone usage can be used as a proxy for population mobility patterns and provide a way of quantifying in near-real time the impact of social distancing measures on changes in mobility. Here we explore patterns of change in densities, domestic and international flows and co-location of Facebook users in the UK from March 2020 to March 2021. We find substantial heterogeneities across time and region, with large changes observed compared to pre-pandemic patterns. The impacts of periods of lockdown on distances travelled and flow volumes are evident, with each showing variations, but some significant reductions in co-location rates. Clear differences in multiple metrics of mobility are seen in central London compared to the rest of the UK, with each of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland showing significant deviations from England at times. Moreover, the impacts of rapid changes in rules on international travel to and from the UK are seen in substantial fluctuations in traveller volumes by destination. While questions remain about the representativeness of the Facebook data, previous studies have shown strong correspondence with census-based data and alternative mobility measures, suggesting that findings here are valuable for guiding strategies.

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[–] • 1 pt

Someone posted here a video by Snowden about geo-localistion by your phone, even if you turn off geo-localisation. Unfortunately, I can't find that video. If I remember correctly, your phone tries to connect to cell-towers around it all the time, and the cell-towers send that info to the provider. With the strength of the signal between your phone and the cell-towers, they can triangulate your position. It's not really precise but it's a start. Also, if you have wifi activated, your phone tries to connect to every wifi access points surrounding it. The google car which took the pictures for Google Street Map also recorded every wifi access points in the streets it drove by, with their position. And when your phone tries to access those wifi, it is either stored in the phone (and maybe accessed remotely without you noticing) or send directly to the internet provider. And they keep that information for as long as they want.

[–] • 1 pt

Thanks for the additional information. Time to go back to a flip phone.

[–] • 1 pt

It doesn't really matter, they can track your phone when it tries to access the cell-towers. The only way is to not take your phone with you when you go somewhere.

[–] • 1 pt

The only way is to not take your phone with you when you go somewhere.

I do that now.

they can track your phone when it tries to access the cell-towers.

I was thinking with the flip phone you can remove the battery. Tough to communicate with cell towers with no power.

[–] • 1 pt

This was old news when Snowden 'leaked' it. Don't think that just turning your phone off or even removing the battery will stop them from using it to monitor you. There are design features in every phone (and other electronics) that have never been revealed.

They know who you associate with just by how close and how long your phone is to another person's phone.

They know more about you than you know about yourself. They evaluate your habits, likes, dislikes, who you associate with, where you go throughout the day and for how long (even from living room to kitchen), how you spend your day, what you spend your money on, what you read or watch online, etc.

They create and maintain psychological profiles on every person in order to know how to manipulate them in any given situation.

It goes a lot deeper than most people realize, has been in planning and development since computers were first invented. It's mostly automated now through 5G tech that can process data at 1000s times the speed of a normal piece of electronics. The Internet of Things is a reflection of the sort of world they've been creating.