Cell Phone Tracking

June 29, 2004 · 1 min read

Purpose:

The purpose of this experiment is to demonstrate the ability to track a cell phone's location electronically. Cell phones are being used all the time now by people of all ages and almost all average income American carries around a cell phone with them at all times. We even occasionally hear them ringing at theaters and in classrooms. Cell phones are two way radio transmitters that work by connecting to a nearby tower and exchanging data. Despite the FCC's limitation on maximum power output of a cell phone, they are still able to connect with towers miles away at UHF frequencies and produce enough RF power to supply those fancy replacement flashing antennas with energy. Because cell phones put out a constant RF output (sometimes pulsed) they can be tracked using the tower triangulation method where the network administrators can find your precise location with their administrative network access. Unfortunately most of us don't have access to the network's administrative features. This experiment will demonstrate an alternative method for tracking a cell phone.

Materials:

- Cell Phone
- BASIC Stamp 2 SX BOE
- UHF RF Diodes
- 330 Ohm Resistor
- LED

More info can be found from http://www.voltsamps.com/pages/projects/cell/ and here is a video http://www.voltsamps.com/pages/projects/cell/cell.mpg.

Tejas Patel

This article is part of the GWB Archives. Original Author: Tejas Patel

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