I want to leave my phone at home or not have it on me most of the time. Most calls I get are meaningless spam and I rarely need to answer my phone for real calls outside my home (though it does happen on ocassion). One thing I do want and am accustomed to is having music, however.
I was looking at Amazon and Aliexpress for devices that can play mp3/mp4s, some can do that and even have ebook readers which is great. I don’t see any connectivity on them or microphones save for the one that is included on the earbuds or Bluetooth.
And that is one question I have: can Bluetooth compromised your privacy? I know Bluetooth hacking is real but how bad is it?
I guess if it has a microphone it is ok if I dont have any connectivity. What do you guys recommend?
I have a modded iPod video as well as a Fiio Snowsky Echo Mini. Both work pretty well for me, though both have obnoxious flaws. The iPod can technically play FLAC files through the Rockbox OS, but it’s wildly sluggish with high-bitrate songs, sometimes even crashing the device in the process. The Echo Mini has an issue with some(?) FLAC files, playing them about 20% slower and at a lower pitch than it’s supposed to, but only for a couple japanese albums (I can’t find anyone else online with this issue, so it might just be something affecting me). Playlist management is kind of a pain on both, but the scroll wheel of the ipod is vastly superior to the buttons on the Echo Mini.
Are you keen on using wireless headphones or speakers? If not, I’d go all the way for one without Bluetooth so the thought of present or future vulnerabilities won’t have to cross my mind whenever I use it.
In addition to the Bluetooth vulnerabilities other commenters have mentioned, a recent one affects headsets with Google’s Fast Pair feature. Once forcibly paired, an adversary can register the headset with their Google account. The headset thereafter pings nearby Android devices as part of the find lost devices network and can be used to track the victim.
Not sure if they are in production any more, but I can recommend the old iPod-looking Walkman and Sansa MP3 players. Currently also using a no-name iPod nano clone for the fact that it has a microSD slot, even upgraded the internal battery a few months ago.
Bluetooth hacking is quite rare. But is possible if the person knows the hardware to hack and then knows the os to hack. 90% of people don’t have to worry about it and the 10% that do have training on how to manage the risk.
For a MP3 player I wouldn’t worry about that. The only thing I would worry about is Bluetooth beckons when shopping. Large retailers use it to track your path through a shop.
With a wired earbud set i think I can keep my Bluetooth turned off. That does usually mean it is off and hackers/corporations can’t get to it, right?
I just got a HIFI Walker G7 and I’m kinda loving it. It runs full android, is made to be an mp3 player, but operates more like a phone without the phone parts. It has Wi-Fi and Bluetooth, but apparently has no location services, which is inconvenient if you want navigation, but great for privacy. It even has a camera.
They have non android mp3 players too if you want something more simple.
IDK if there are many of those things still being made, but sure, if there’s any private info on the player and you’re trying to be ultra careful, then get one without Bluetooth. I can also imagine (IDK if this has actually been done) someone using a bluetooth attack to turn the player into an audio bug from (say) the next room.
Players do tend to have built in microphones so you can use them as audio recorders. I had (and mostly still have) a bunch of different ones, though they were audio only and not video, or at any rate had tiny screens. There are tons of them on ebay.
If you’re going to carry a big player with video and an ebook reader, why not just take your phone? Put it in a mode that blocks all calls. Or get another phone and use it with no sim and turn off the wifi. Then you can run your usual audio and video players. Dedicated players were once popular but now are very niche, since everyone uses their phone now.
FIIO makes some good ones if you still want to shop around.
I have an ancient but functional Galaxy Ace 2. It a 2012 vintage. Would that be able to track me or would I be safe? It is a 3G max and is not 4g or LTE capable.
I’m not going to claim to be a privacy/security expert here, but I think the question is “safe from who/what?” Privacy is a sliding scale with diminishing returns, so you need to set your expectations according to the level of effort you are willing to put in.
If you just want to not be tracked/profiled by commercial big data or standard governmental operations, then an old phone with no sim, wifi/bluetooth turned off, and using wired headphones removes you from a couple tiers of lowest-hanging fruit.
But if you think someone is specifically and actively tracking you in particular, that is a whole other question.
Airplane mode might be enough to shut off the radios in a phone that old. Also the 3G network is basically shut down now. So it’s a matter of just how careful you want to be. You might be able to use some kind of field strength meter to tell if the phone is still sending any radio signals.