Smartphone battery could be spying on you

Phone batteries are sending out information that could be used to identify their owners and track them around the internet, even if they have taken very careful privacy precautions, according to a paper by security researchers, says The Independent.
A piece of software in HTML5 — the technology used to let people read sites on the web — tells websites how much battery is left in a users’ phone, and is intended to allow websites to help preserve battery if phones are running low. But that same information can be used to identify phones as they move around the internet, allowing people to be tracked.

Websites and the scripts that run on them don’t have to ask users’ permission to see how much charge is left, so phones will respond to the request to say how much charge they have and how long it will take them to power back up. That information can then be used as a way of identifying the phones themselves, without their users ever knowing.

Read more: http://en.prothom-alo.com/science-technology/news/74315/Smartphone-battery-could-be-spying-on-you

Image courtesy of Ohmega1982 at FreeDigitalPhotos.net
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