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“LE Privacy.”

mclean2016mclean2016
in General

Lots of talk about "LE Privacy". I don't know if this question has been asked/answered but is there any provision in the IOS app for BLE security?

"Bluetooth Smart peripherals, such as activity trackers, announce their presence to other devices through a process known as advertising. Bluetooth Smart advertising packets also contain a MAC address to identify the device. To safeguard user privacy, manufacturers can make use of a Bluetooth Smart feature known as “LE Privacy.” This feature causes the MAC address within the advertising packets to be replaced with a random value that changes at timing intervals determined by the manufacturer. Any malicious device(s), placed at intervals along your travel route, would not be able to determine that the series of different, randomly generated MAC addresses received from your device actually relates to the same physical device. It actually looks like a series of different devices, thus, it will not be possible to track you using the advertised MAC address."

Comments

  • MattMatt
    Hi @mclean2016

    Presently this mode is not supported in iOS.  BLE privacy depends on pairing device with a phone and using it only with that one phone.  Most users are using the sensors anonymously, and the MAC address is used (especially in Android) to identify a unique device.

    What are your privacy goals and concerns in your project?
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