People may no longer need a smartphone, smartwatch or connected gadget to be digitally tracked. According to researchers in Germany, simply walking through a room with WiFi signals could soon be enough. German Scientists have revealed a new tracking method that uses ordinary WiFi routers to identify individuals by analyzing how their bodies interact with surrounding radio waves. The researchers say the technique is accurate enough to recognize specific people even when they are not carrying any electronic devices.
The study has sparked fresh concerns over privacy and surveillance, particularly because the technology relies on infrastructure already embedded almost everywhere — homes, cafés, airports, offices and public buildings.
What is even more interesting is that unlike CCTV cameras or facial-recognition systems, the tracking remains effectively invisible.
The researchers developed an attack method called BFId, which exploits a WiFi feature known as Beamforming Feedback Information (BFI). Introduced with WiFi 5 technology, BFI helps routers optimize wireless performance by collecting feedback signals from connected devices.
The problem, according to the researchers, is that these signals are continuously transmitted without encryption.
That means nearby WiFi devices can passively capture the information without users realizing it.
Using machine learning models, the researchers analyzed these radio signals to generate what they describe as “radio images” of people moving through a space. Instead of using light, like a conventional camera, the system studies how human bodies alter the movement of radio waves.
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