Activists from the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), an association which defends the digital interests of users and their rights to privacy, have revealed and highly praised a new option that has gone unnoticed in Android 12, namely the possibility of disabling connections 2G.
Indeed, this obsolete standard is riddled with security flaws and used by law enforcement to intercept the metadata and content of mobile phone communications on the sly. To do this, they use devices called “IMSI Catcher”, capable of simulating operator base stations.
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Once the target connects to it, the device downgrades the communication from 4G to 2G, and voila. Note that there is unfortunately not only the police who use this type of gear.
Private pharmacies do it too, and even some geek individuals. All you have to do is buy an SDR (Software Defined Radio) type transceiver and use the open source software that is fine.
Android’s new feature will not completely eliminate this risk of hacking, as there are also flaws in the 3G and 4G standards that IMSI Catchers can use. But it will still limit exposure to this risk and avoid being trapped too easily.
To use this feature, go to Settings -> Network & Internet -> SIM Profiles. At the very bottom, you will then find the setting in question.
However, the option does not always exist. For 2G to be deactivated, the modem must be relatively recent. Note, moreover, that 2G will still work for emergency calls. The ball is now in the court of Apple, which has not yet offered this type of functionality for its smartphones.
Source : CLEAR