Location Tracking
Location tracking attacks exploit LTE protocols and network architecture to determine the physical location of mobile devices without user consent or awareness.
Technical Overview
LTE location tracking can be performed through various methods: paging message analysis, timing advance measurements, cell tower triangulation, or exploiting location services protocols. Attackers can achieve varying levels of precision from cell-level to GPS-accurate positioning.
- •Privacy violations through location surveillance
- •Stalking and harassment enablement
- •Physical security threats
- •Intelligence gathering
- •Targeted attack preparation
- •Paging message monitoring for presence detection
- •Timing advance measurement for distance calculation
- •Multiple rogue eNodeB for triangulation
- •SUPL protocol exploitation
- •Cell tower database correlation
- 1Deploy multiple rogue eNodeBs or monitoring stations
- 2Trigger paging for target device
- 3Measure signal characteristics (timing advance, RSSI)
- 4Perform triangulation calculations
- 5Correlate with cell tower database
- 6Track movement over time
- Disable location services when not needed
- Use location privacy features in OS
- Monitor for unusual paging activity
- Use VPN to mask network-level location
- Implement IMSI/SUPI privacy protection
- Deploy anti-tracking technologies
- →Law enforcement tracking operations
- →Stalking and domestic abuse cases
- →Corporate espionage and competitor tracking
- →Government surveillance programs
- →Targeted advertising and analytics
Related Attacks
Despite 4G LTE's improved security, IMSI extraction attacks exploit vulnerabilities in the attach procedure to capture subscriber identities before encryption is established.
Rogue eNodeB attacks involve deploying fake LTE base stations that impersonate legitimate network infrastructure to intercept communications and perform man-in-the-middle attacks.
IMSI catchers are rogue base stations that trick mobile devices into connecting to them, allowing attackers to capture International Mobile Subscriber Identity (IMSI) numbers and intercept communications.