You would take out your phone if you would like to make a phone call, or check to see if you have received any messages. For the other 99% of your day, the IoT sensors being stuck on every conceivable object are unable to report back to HQ (and every agency and broker affiliated) your current whereabouts and trajectory.

So why not get a more basic phone and not a smart phone?

Dumb phones still ping cell towers?

Sure, but they also have simpler hardware that's easier to audit and almost all have removable batteries, which is most likely just as effective as a faraday bag.

My employer isn't tracking me "all day, every day, wherever I am." Is yours?

Only to the extent they are able. But you and I are being tracked regardless, by hundreds/thousands of other entities, commercial and government, to the extent they are able. 5G/IoT is the latest weapon in their arsenal.

Welcome to 5G...

Well, most people have never heard of "parallel construction" in the first place, and chances are they mostly have no interest in learning about it.

So combatting willful ignorance would be the first step, but my optimism meter broke a while ago.

The only option is to cage your phone in a Faraday bag and only use it when necessary. Trust no company. Trust no government.

But it won't be. And even if it were, let us remember how well the law works to curtail crime among governments and wealthy corporations and individuals. They'll hide it, "repurpose it", lie about it, and engage in years-long legal battles during which time the public loses interest. If it is more profitable to break the law and pay the fine, that is the best business decision.

That's true... and that's why we should push for 2 things to happen when it is found that a business knowingly broke the law (or knew it was at risk of breaking and went on anyways) : - a "proportionate" fine should never be less than 100% of the profits derived from their behaviour - whoever authorized the company to go forward should be personally on the hook too

You're on HN and "What's the difference" is really your question? 1. Friendly private human interaction shared by two people. 2. Data is collected, sent, analyzed, sold, shared, distributed, stolen, and abused in order to maximize profit across expansive markets at the expense of any respect for the user's privacy. The user is tracked, distracted, and tricked into obeying algorithmic market forces of massive and opaque breadth. Every piece of data ever accrued is collected and stored in order to create an invasive profile of a user's movements, decisions, actions, and relationships, so that predictive programming can be implemented in attempts to guess the state of the user's mind prior to the user coming to these conclusions, or at least to convince the user that this is what the user wants. The end goal is technology that effectively usurps the user's free will, so that the user is completely reliant upon it for basic decision-making. The goal is to destroy free will. A society in which every individual action is known by governments and corporations is not a healthy society. It is an electronic prison.

This just seems like such absurd hyperbole I can't tell if you are serious or not. "technology that effectively usurps the user's free will" "electronic prison"

I don't believe any of this. Nobody can usurp my free will no matter how much data they have on me. Heck, even if I told them every last piece of private information I knew about me, I doubt they could increase my spending even 1% more than I currently am with all the coupons and targeted advertising and subliminal marketing in the world.

I'm glad that you feel you are immune to these advances. That doesn't change the corporate agenda though. They want you to buy their stuff. You, me, everyone. They pay loads of money to teams of people dedicated to utilizing the latest technologies to bend your will to their desire, with whatever tricks their minds may conjure. They work in concert with others doing the same. It's "just business".

We have a global population that is addicted to their phones. A great deal of their worldview is shaped on a daily basis by a small illuminated screen that fits in the palm of the hand, full of deception and manipulation, which goes well beyond grocery shopping. The phone is an ideal espionage tool since, for most people, it is turned on and broadcasting constantly, and always at its user's side. I mentioned "electronic prison", scaling out from this, in the sense that law-abiding citizens are under constant surveillance, similar to inmates in a prison. We have the ability to move around of course, but we can hardly do so without being watched, which does not equate to actual freedom. The human experience is being overrun by addictive technology that manipulates our will through mechanisms that are totally unknown by the average user. It may seem like hyperbole because its full effects have not yet been understood. It's not like this is the end: this is just where we are today. The intrusion into our lives will only escalate.

I find it interesting that the article doesn't mention how various agencies track you through bluetooth beacons when you drive down a road or walk around a city. These devices are in plain view for everyone to see, but for some reason it seems that most people don't see them and basically nobody ever talks about them, yet they are everywhere.

Sometimes I ask people about the cameras and the white boxes (those ubiquitous white boxes on poles, often solar-powered, along highways pointing perpendicular to moving traffic). I ask what they think - who put them up, what data they collect, where that data goes. I am routinely met with blank stares and "I don't know what you're talking about". It baffles me.