Is it possible to track your location via the phone even after disabling GPS?

 

A decade or two ago, tracing someone's whereabouts was very difficult, if not impossible, for the average person as it required leverage, research, multiple security clearances, not to mention elite technology, and of course a man in a hat with sunglasses and a newspaper. Now, the tracking process is very easy, even easier than answering 7X8, but the most important question is: Can my phone be tracked without turning on location services or GPS?

 

You will be terrified once you know that someone is tracking your movements like your shadow, and this is, unfortunately, a reality with our mobile phones. Still, we have lived with it as a way of life, but it does not eliminate the idea that - when the need arises, of course - you will be monitored by step wherever you move around the world. Do you think it's overrated? Absolutely not, especially if you know that what you hear in the news about operations - the liquidation of prominent personalities - is accurate, which is a missile launched by a drone, directed at the victim's mobile phone.

 

Is disabling GPS sufficient to ensure that I am not tracked?

 

We all know that all smartphones in the world come with location services or GPS, which generally helps us to locate delivery companies, taxis, or even to know restaurants near us using Google maps or others. But what if you want some privacy, is it enough to disable the GPS so that no one can know where you are? Answer: Definitely not!

 

In theory, turning off the GPS is very useful for hiding your location, but it is limited by other methods that allow detecting the location of your device whether you turn on or off the GPS service. What are these ways? A great question, I will answer you in the following lines about the most important of them.

 

1- Communication towers

 

They are everywhere and you can accurately track your phone through a method known as “triangulation” by identifying the cell towers to which your phone is connected and measuring how long the signal takes to make a round trip between the towers and your phone, where the time is calculated and converted into a specific range indicating where you are It is worth mentioning that you will call any cell tower as soon as you turn on your phone and you do not need to make a call or send a text message,  only three cell towers can locate you very accurately.

 

2- Public Wi-Fi networks

 

There have been a lot of free Wi-Fi networks in recent times, and connecting to one of them remains tempting if the Internet service is not available on your device, but it can also track you even if the GPS is disabled, as most of these networks save the MAC address of your device in exchange for allowing you to connect to it This is in order to keep a record of the places you visit each time you contact the same company provider.

 

3- Stingrays or cell tower simulators

 

These are cell tower simulators that are meant to track your phone instead of providing you with a real connection! They broadcast signals like those of cell towers but with stronger waves, forcing cell phones to disconnect from and connect to real cell towers. As with cell towers, Cell Tower Simulators can infer your phone's location by measuring and converting the time it takes for the signal to make a round trip between your phone and a Stingray or fake cell tower simulator.

 

4- Spyware and Malware

 

You might think that a Trojan horse is a computer-only malicious program, unfortunately, there are many of them dedicated to tracking mobile devices even if location services are disabled, which are often pre-installed on the device, as they infiltrate the mobile phone system in order to track its location and hide in several ways, including as an update to improve the user's Internet speed.

 

Is there a safe way to prevent my location from being tracked?

 

It is true that there are several ways to track your phone even by disabling the GPS, but fortunately, there are also several ways to ensure that it is not tracked, which you can follow if you want some privacy, or perhaps out of knowledge of the matter, nothing less or more:

 

1- Turn off Wi-Fi in public places: If water invalidates tayammum, the same rule applies to smartphones, as they automatically connect to any available Wi-Fi network instead of using data, that network may be one of the public networks that collect data on Geographical location. Therefore, we advise you to turn off Wi-Fi when you are in public places as long as it is not needed.

 

2- Disabling location services (GPS): Although there are several methods used to track your device if location services are turned off, they are limited in use and do not exceed the number of fingers on one hand. On the other hand, anyone can track you if you turn on the GPS, and stopping it provides a layer of Security against the most popular website trackers.

 

3- Browse with VPN: A Virtual Private Network (VPN) allows you to surf the internet anonymously by creating a private network from a public internet connection. When you use a VPN while browsing, it encrypts your internet data, masking your IP address and physical location. This way, you are covered even if you visit a site that collects visitor site data.

 

4- Download applications from official stores: Many unofficial sites and stores offer paid applications for free, the truth is that there is nothing for free, as the application may contain malicious software that will track you of your own free will, so install applications from official stores and disable the installation of applications From third-party sources to ensure you are not tracked, installing an antivirus is double protection from malicious apps and files, suspicious websites, and dangerous links.

 

5- Check app permissions: All apps require certain permissions to function properly. But you should be wary of suspicious permission requests, specifically those that ask you to get location permission that you don't need, for example, that the battery consumption monitor app asks you to access your location, which means that the app is designed mainly to monitor you, you are not consuming Battery We advise you to uninstall any app that asks for irrational permissions. You can also find alternatives in the App Store if you urgently need to use the function.

 

6- Keep your device software up-to-date: In our article [Why should you get rid of your old Android phone?], we talked about the risks of using a device that does not receive periodic updates, including security, so one of the best ways to keep your device safe is to update your software regularly. Operating system updates usually include security patches that fix vulnerabilities in code. Therefore, if a new vulnerability is found, it is less likely to be affected if your software is up-to-date.

 

7- Factory Reset: “The Last Cure” Factory reset is the last available solution in case you suspect that your device has been hacked, as it will delete all the data on your phone, so make sure you back up everything before proceeding, you must Note that factory reset is useful if the malicious application is running in the background or installed as a system application, as for normal applications, the antivirus program can take care of it

 

Can communication towers be prevented from tracking my device?

 

Your mobile phone needs a constant connection to nearby cell towers to function properly. The only way to stop tracking your carrier or cell tower is to turn off the mobile and remove the battery, which is the only way to ensure that your device is not tracked so that anyone trying to track your device after it is turned off will only be able to know the location it was in before it was turned off.

 

Conclusion: Although there are several methods that are used to track your device in the event that location services are turned off, they are used by specific people or certain organizations, and these methods do not exceed the number of fingers of one hand, on the other hand, even a pizza delivery operator can track you if you turn on location services, so It is enough to disable location services to ensure that you are not tracked in the normal case, in other cases not carrying a mobile phone is the only way to not be tracked.