cell phone anonymity

[Declan McCullagh]

On Mon, Jan 08, 2001 at 10:40:37AM -0500, Adam Shostack wrote:
> The E911 requirements in the US include a requirement for covert 
> "authorized" querying of the phone's location.  Doubtless, this
> message will be strongly authenticated by a police-only PKI, and your
> phone will log it for later audit purposes.

Yes. See:

http://www.wired.com/news/print/0,1294,40623,00.html

Probably the biggest push toward including location information came,
ironically enough, from the federal government. In 1996 the Federal
Communications Commission began the lengthy process of requiring
cell-phone companies to build location-broadcasting

The justification: enhanced 911 service, which lets emergency workers
find you when you're on the road.

The FCC required that of all the handsets sold by carriers by December
2001, 25 percent must support location broadcasts, and 100 percent
must by December 2002. By December 2005, 95 percent of all handsets in
use must be able to broadcast location data, tNow that the regulations
are in place -- status reports were due last month -- businesses are
considering what else to do with the features.

-Declan