Lets imagine that I'm evil and bad person who creates world infection that circulates all over the world and physical carriers of which are millions of people all over the globe. Recently I just spied on their computers but I also need to do so on street, shower, sauna, where there were no computers at all. I need to know the situation at specific point on the map or in a certain region, not just through satellite and annually, but daily or even hourly.
I activate your pokemon and throw the job in the region. Thousands of people take to the streets, looking for something that I threw on the map. You monitor everything that I want wherever I need. I gather visual, audio, navigational data and know who when and where catches the pokemon.
#PokemonGo in action
In fact, I can check any part of the region, and upon the reaction of the users I can figure out where closed area, secret facility or strategically important buildings are located.
Moreover I can build network protocols of encrypted information exchange. In fact, I control the movement of people, forcing them to move their own smartphones and processing power to where I need.
The one can control the movements of people, forcing them to move their own smartphones and processing power to WHERE I NEED. I have full information about the owners of smartphones and information about their movement.
There are plenty use cases of this #technology. Lets imagine, it's necessary to establish surveillance of a group of people, say VIP, military or business. I activate pokémon catchers in their vicinity and conduct them by "eyes" and "ears" of the pokemon hunters. The one can easily find out if the car is parked in a certain place, or the object of surveillance entered to specific door. Knowing the specific key and cipher, by the movement of hunters and their target pokemons, I can pass any relevant information.
There are lots of such use cases. Now the main thing.
There is nothing wrong with augmented reality. This is a cool #development, if not for one thing. Any cool technology will not always be used for its intended purpose. It's hard to notice, except that persuasive advertising or aggressive promotion of the product, which under natural conditions will barely become so popular. Neither the commercial firm, nor the developer can afford such an aggressive marketing AROUND the world, except probably two largest giants or intelligence agency. Moreover, such a firm as a partner Pokemon or Nintendo.
I also Declare.
Having the opportunity of observing the planet as satellites and from stationary computers, mobile devices, and now being able to guide them in the right locations and places - I basically control the world.
Anyone who has access to the database of #Google, #PokemonGo, #Facebook, #Whatsapp, #Instagram - in fact sees and hears the WORLD.
And now the main thing.
The main functions of this dual system is not activated yet. And if you miss the time - the system will be complemented by modules, including active up to AI or precision strikes guidance systems, computer hacking modules, etc. Do you catch pokemon in the server? Or large office? Congratulations!
For your system it's worse than syphilis for you.
Because I know for sure that the pokémon catcher is lounging around your office and at the right time, I just activate the phone's camera and microphone to read any information.
If all of a sudden if you're not in the right place, I will FORCE YOUR ASS to get out there, walk a few meters to the right door and catch a #pokemon.
To be continued...
Follow Me on #Steemit if you want to to be the first to see my posts.
Alex Smirnov
Meanwhile in Russia https://steemit.com/pokemon/@acidsun/russian-bank-offers-free-pokemon-go-insurance
Even despite It hasn't been released to official stores yet)
PokemonGo has permissions for your camera, location, and supposedly email. A quick google search shows that even the camera permissions suggest that access is required at all times. Additionally, there is no mention on how the data from the camera is stored or used. Lastly, in the terms of service it says that they can disclose this data "…to government or law enforcement officials or private parties as we, in our sole discretion, believe necessary or appropriate: (a) to respond to claims, legal process (including subpoenas); (b) to protect our property, rights, and safety and the property, rights, and safety of a third party or the public in general; and (c) to identify and stop any activity that we consider illegal, unethical, or legally actionable activity."
Now imagine this:
You're a drug lord with piles of illegal drugs and cash laying around the house. You also have a couple kids with their own phones playing PokemonGo.
The kids go about scanning throughout the house looking for Pokemon but they happen to scan your stash which is data that they collect. Now if what they say about the NSA and government agencies being able to spy through users' phones is true, then your kids playing PokemonGo pretty much just scanned and gave out the location of all the illegal stuff that you have.
Now for most citizens they are not doing anything illegal or don't have anything to hide. However, I think it's still a big deal that a centralized service is collecting data of personal stuff that you have with your location. Even if their intentions are good, what if that centralized service that collects that info is hacked and leaked? Are you comfortable with people you don't know knowing what you have inside your house even if nothing is illegal? If you have Trump posters in your bedroom or other personal items that can identify you to a group which can put you on a list or make you a target of a hate crime, shouldn't you be worried?
I mean we see stories in the news of the kids of celebrities flashing bling and exposing their own parents for tax evasion. One example are kids posting their parents hidden assets on Instagram trying to brag but ends up backfiring here: http://metro.co.uk/2016/04/06/rich-kids-of-instagram-have-been-giving-away-their-parents-naughty-tax-secrets-5799513/
Most people are not aware of this but if you're on here reading this, then now you are.
@sephiroth, I like the way you think. I pretty much think of it as invasion to private life of wide range of people. I think will hear about a lot of cases with exposing by PokemonGO.
I made some investigation and it turned out that one of the major investors of PokemonGo is CIA (I'll tell about it in further posts). And surprisingly I faced the [news that Edward Snowden was (
https://medium.com/@jeremybornstein/edward-snowden-captured-b3cac4ad389c#.e261g227n) captured in Moscow (where he is hiding for several years) when he was hunting rare pokemons).
I'm not sure about the intensions of the creators, but I completely agree with you on the potential of the platform to be used for malicious intent
I don't know if it's a weapon but it sure ain't improving the state of humanity:
I don't know about it being a weapon, but for sure it doesn't improve the state of humanity...
I mean, I agree that it's a bit sad that people need motivation to be social, go outside, and move around. However, considering how technology has pushed us to be more sedentary and disinterested, I am not all that against people using a game to get back to their roots, so to speak. There are always two sides to every coin...although, I can definitely understand why someone would be demoralized about humanity needing PokemonGo.
Google already mapped a large amount of WIFI hotspots by gathering the signal strength and MAC address data during the Google Street Views project. This information is used for example when you enable geolocation feature in your Firefox browser.
Excerpt from https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/geolocation/
How does it work?
When you visit a location-aware website, Firefox will ask you if you want to share your location. If you consent, Firefox gathers information about nearby wireless access points and your computer’s IP address. Then Firefox sends this information to the default geolocation service provider, Google Location Services, to get an estimate of your location. That location estimate is then shared with the requesting website.
Most of the people with Android phones also backup their WIFI hotspot data to Google. Now Google has map of hotspot locations, combined with who owns these hotspots, so its very easy to tell the precise location where someone with an Android phone lives.
Now imagine only the precision they can achieve with PokemonGo. Not to mention all the other possibilities that the OP talked about.
The spooky thing is that Google already did the mapping once without asking any user consent. I see no reason why they won't do it again.
Samy Kamkar also mentions how Google mapped the WIFI hotspots in his amazing DEFCON talk:
Thanks @deepbits for such an interesting facts.
Yes, Google, Apple and other big companies use power of crowd in order to massively collect data. This approach as also known as crowdsourcing. It's applied to gather info about Wi-Fi/Bluetoth access points that's used then to refine positioning accuracy in their maps. But it hasn't been applied yet to perform visual mapping. and I think PokemonGo is a big step toward this direction!
The potential for abuse definitely exists. But I think the scope of the problem is a little smaller than stated. First, think about the amount of processing power it would take to sift through all of that data. Not very many entities have access to in-memory databases to feed this information into. Secondly, if at any point someone actually tried to exploit PokemonGo in the manner you suggest, that particular act would go public eventually. It would be a one-and-done tactic. PokemonGo only remains an attractive target as long as it is full of naive users, and as long as the vulnerabilities aren't public. Most people won't be continuously manipulated in the exact same manner, especially if the dangers are known. If we are having this much discussion about the dangers of PokemonGo before anything bad even happens, imagine the amount of scrutiny that would be applied should something actually occur. While I do not think PokemonGo is harmless, I do see the benefit in the game, from a certain perspective. Personally, I do not play...and I am not anymore fearful for the lives of those that do than I was before it was introduced.
Hi, Nikola. Thanks for the descriptive post!
Currently we can't predict whether it'll be used for other purposes and only for entertainment purposes. But investors and so aggressive marketing look a bit suspicious. I will tell about it in further posts
I am definitely interested to continue to hear from you on the subject. Thanks for your work!
https://steemit.com/news/@stompy/putin-to-ban-pokemon-go-in-russia
Interesting fact is that this game is not yet published in official stores in Russia, but officials already concerned as there were revealed a lot of PokemonGo players hunting rear pokemons nearby Kremlin and military objects
I posted this one a few days ago:
I just recently watched this episode again...lulz...timely post.
It's will not happen in my country! Why? Because Pokemon Go will not available in my country. Good luck have a good journey :)
Useful information , thanks
South Park called this years ago with the takeover of America by Pokemon. I wont touch that game. Haven't tried it and never plan to.
I totally agree with your statement about being able to control masses of people to an area of your choice. Hey if Pokemon Jumps off a bridge will everyone do it?
Quality post Phenom. Great work. I believe we are witnessing next level on 'let's see how dumb they really are'
Peekemon
thanks, @seamusog. Will see where all this move further
Yea I was thinking this exact same thing man... this game is a complete tool for the CIA. 100% positive.
wonder if someone will call this a weapon of mass destruction?
At least it could be part of mass destruction weapon. Hunting pokemons people can actually direct missle to some predefined locations
It's sad that people want to find a conspiracy theory everywhere, even in a game.
First of all, i would like to mention that implementing malware in videogames is a risky thing. Here's why: Pokemon Go is still not supported in many countries, so those Android users who want to play Pokemon Go, need to download APK instead of searching it in Google Play. It appears that one of the most popular APK files contained some malware in it. That was exposed by some users on Reddit and other forums just days after the release. It's very easy to loose users trust in 2016, remember how Windows 10 and data mining was exposed?
If there really was a backdoor in Pokemon GO code, that would allow the potential "bad person" to spy on users, using this app, then, it would have been already found. Thousands of coders, game hackers (the people that use their skills to obtain boosts in games), developers that want to make another game clone - they would share this with the people, as it would be a potential app destroyer, so they would be able to make their own clones and have all the profits possible.
Also, it's silly. Why would people from spy agencies develop a game, based on a setting, that costs billions of USD, instead of negotiating the possible backdoor in the OS. People don't catch Pokemons 24/7. People don't use the app 24/7 Yeah, i know about youth and kids, but if we are talking about some Gov people...
You can also play without using the camera. AR is just an option.
In my opinion, these kind of theories (about applications) should be always backed with code/data control logs that prove the statements.
And if there was an idea of forcing you to be in needed locations in-game, developers wouldn't have made Lure Modules and Incense :) These items attract Pokémon to you.