Google Groups no longer supports new Usenet posts or subscriptions. Historical content remains viewable.
Dismiss

Tracking a missing person's phone?

2,620 views
Skip to first unread message

Tim+

unread,
Jul 2, 2013, 8:59:21 AM7/2/13
to
How easily can the police find the last cell where a mobile phone was
before running out of battery? A friend's son has gone missing and his
phone is dead.

If it was a smart phone, do the networks log GPS position of handset? Do
the police routinely check this kind of thing in missing persons cases?

Please no flippant responses, there are good reasons to be very concerned
in this case.

Tim

Roland Perry

unread,
Jul 2, 2013, 9:15:27 AM7/2/13
to
In message
<2062954561394462521.066427timdo...@news.ete
rnal-september.org>, at 13:59:21 on Tue, 2 Jul 2013, Tim+
<timdow...@nospampleaseyahoo.co.uk> remarked:
>How easily can the police find the last cell where a mobile phone was
>before running out of battery?

Very easily. Via the much-maligned RIPA.

> A friend's son has gone missing and his phone is dead.
>
>If it was a smart phone, do the networks log GPS position of handset?

No, but app-accounts linked to the phone might be saving it. (eg "Find
my phone" and others which are not quite so overtly tracking location).
The problem is that most of that data is off-shore.

But if the family has his log-ins to those apps, it would help.

>Do the police routinely check this kind of thing in missing persons
>cases?

I hope so, but only once they are sure it's a genuine missing person
case. The police are normally unwilling to act in such things until some
time has passed, or other evidence has emerged that the person is
non-voluntarily missing.
--
Roland Perry

Tim+

unread,
Jul 2, 2013, 9:38:58 AM7/2/13
to
Unlikely in this case. Attended an interview on the Friday and was due to
attend another one on Monday that he didn't appear for. Getting a very bad
feeling about this all. :-(

Tim

Roland Perry

unread,
Jul 2, 2013, 9:43:47 AM7/2/13
to
In message <YWkfH8Kv...@perry.co.uk>, at 14:15:27 on Tue, 2 Jul
2013, Roland Perry <rol...@perry.co.uk> remarked:
>>If it was a smart phone, do the networks log GPS position of handset?
>
>No, but app-accounts linked to the phone might be saving it. (eg "Find
>my phone" and others which are not quite so overtly tracking location).
>The problem is that most of that data is off-shore.

And, of course, only if they have the GPS switched on.

I switch mine off purely to preserve the battery.

A more granular location is available, however, from cell-site into and
any wifi hotspots the phone might have seen.

But all, except cell-site info from the network, might not have been
uploaded, if the smartphone had its data connection disabled.
--
Roland Perry

R. Mark Clayton

unread,
Jul 4, 2013, 10:58:30 AM7/4/13
to
A lost phone can be located to within hundreds of metres by triangulation
from cell masts and the network usually remember where a phone was last
used - as this is where they will start polling for it if someone tries to
ring it.

Some phones can have their GPS enabled remotely if they are left online -
this will get the location to within a few metres and many an iPhone or
tablet thief has been caught this way.


"Tim+" <timdow...@nospampleaseyahoo.co.uk> wrote in message
news:2062954561394462521.066427timdo...@news.eternal-september.org...

Tim+

unread,
Jul 4, 2013, 11:45:49 AM7/4/13
to
Shoulda followed up. Missing person eventually turned up alive and well
and completely oblivious to the consternation he had caused his parents.
Tracked down via Facebook messages eventually.

Tim

tony sayer

unread,
Jul 4, 2013, 12:28:14 PM7/4/13
to
In article <1687093284394645348.418937timdownie2003-nospampleaseyahoo.co
.u...@news.eternal-september.org>, Tim+ <timdownie2003@nospampleaseyahoo.c
o.uk> scribeth thus
Pleased to hear it:) A friends daughter went on trip across the Arizona
desert once whilst working in the USofA. Was out of touch for a few
weeks totally forgot to tell her parents or most anyone else where she
was going, it caused a LOT of sleepless night's and distress for
them!...

ISTR that in the case of the missing girls in Soham they the police did
have a very good idea where the mobile was used last, but this was back
in 2002 so I suppose its come a bit of a way since that time ..


--
Tony Sayer


archna...@gmail.com

unread,
Aug 1, 2020, 12:34:07 AM8/1/20
to

Peter Johnson

unread,
Aug 4, 2020, 12:57:03 PM8/4/20
to
On Fri, 31 Jul 2020 21:34:04 -0700 (PDT), archna...@gmail.com
wrote:
The phone companies log the masts that the phone connects to, even if
no calls are made. So when the Police ask they can be told, within a
small area, where the phone was when it last connected to the network.

David Woolley

unread,
Aug 5, 2020, 8:44:21 AM8/5/20
to
This is a zombie thread (seven years old), and the difficulty would have
been the court order, rather than the technology.
>

Peter Johnson

unread,
Aug 5, 2020, 2:37:11 PM8/5/20
to
On Wed, 5 Aug 2020 13:44:09 +0100, David Woolley
<da...@ex.djwhome.demon.invalid> wrote:


>
>This is a zombie thread (seven years old), and the difficulty would have
>been the court order, rather than the technology.

Oops. Should have notices that.
0 new messages