I bought this device to try out as a smaller alternative to the bigger GPS tracker units a few years ago. It's interesting, but it's not a proper tracker.
Your Mom was lucky to have a son like you to do all this for her. Even though she may not get what you are doing - you were there for her and that's what counts.
Fascinating. The interesting thing about the "SOS" button is if I found this up on a shelf somewhere and was trying to figure out what it was, the first thing I would do is press the button. If someone were using it as a listening device, in call only mode, getting a call from the device would be their way of knowing it had been discovered.
I worked in a car dealership outside of Chicago. People would buy a car without any intention of making payments. Whenever we would find them and repossess the car they would always be amazed how we always found them. I personally installed about 500 GPS trackers in those cars... The customers would sometimes catch on so I had to start installing diversion trackers.... fake blinky trackers that are easy to find so the customer sees it and removes it and thinks they've gotten rid of it... but they were just a diversion. The real tracker of course wouldn't be blinky and in plain sight.
+Valentin Meneses Normally, yes. Its illegal. Knowing this, we of course have a clause in each contract where they have to sign acknowledging that the vehicle might or might not have GPS. As most of you probably do, the customers didn't read this... they just blindly signed the paperwork. Just goes to show that you should read what you sign, especially when it comes to a shady car dealership that offers in-house financing to people with no credit or bad credit with low down payments.
+BachikoiBabi It's actually become quite common for car dealers that offer pay here type payment plans to lower income areas to install hardwired trackers that are also capable of shutting the car down (actually I think it just disables the starter). They get shoved pretty far into the wiring too. I bought a car from a junkyard that had one set off & since it was so damaged they sent it to the junkyard it was hard to turn back on. Never did manage to tear it out I got a wire from the foot well to bridge with a hot wire and then it started from the ignition, then you had to shut off the ignition and unbridge the wires to drive. Annoying little task for my little topaz. Great car, other than that and the giant car shaped dent in the side.
+BachikoiBabi Firstly, I don't believe your story which is almost certainly a lie. Secondly, if a dealership unknowingly installed a GPS in a car I purchased, I would never do business with them again.
Keep in mind that "Tracker" might just be an inaccurate translation from the Chinese "Voice Tracker", which obviously is not a GPS tracker. I've learned to be a bit leery when reading product descriptions especially on poorly translated Chinese products. ;)
Clive, I like your videos. As an M.S. Electronic Engineer, I sometimes have problems conversing at a level laymen and novices can understand. You're teaching me how to speak on a different level than what I am accustomed with so many other professionals I work with on a daily basis. Keep up the good work, my friend.
I looked into these a while ago, and though fun (For geo-caching games etc) they're not solid enough for applications where they are depended on. Due to the audio bug feature, they're also illegal in Germany. There are a few variants on this theme now, too. One being a USB charging cable with the basic bits of this (Sans battery) concealed in the USB connector, allowing spying on anyone you can give a USB cable to! :-o The "GPS" is actually "A-GPS" which is, basically, GSM triangulation. It works well, but only in areas where there's good GSM coverage. Finally: A lot of these trackers are suspected to also send their tracking output to unknown parties as well as the user operating it, so these should never be relied upon for confidential applications. :-)
IT IS a proper tracker... your device doesn't have the antenna strip inside the case. You need to register your personal number using an SQ code so the device will recognize your phone number as the controller. Then a "DW" text will correctly send you GPS coordinates provided you loaded or topped up some credits into the account. But in your case, your antenna is missing. It's like a small strip of metal tape that goes around the top inside the case and touches that small spring-like metal at the corner of the circuit board.
Lloyd Marriott You really shouldn't be fucking Alzheimer's sufferers. There's quite a substantial grey area (not just pubic) when it comes to the ability to competently grant consent.
I remember the early cell phones that I had if I wanted to use the navigation app for turn-by-turn directions it didn't use actual GPS it used triangulation from cell towers which had known GPS positions. if I was driving in the mountains and lost signal, God forbid I missed my turn or encountered a detour because the software would just dump the current route and try to query the server to build a new route and if I didn't remember how to get back to where there was signal I would be screwed.
No. The one in this video is missing the antenna. My Mini A8 has an antenna strip that goes all around the case and touches directly with that little spring at the corner. Without the antenna, the device won't be able to give you accurate location data.
LOL what a sneaky thing! First the bogus GPS false advertising then the really sneaky stuff starts when you get it to work as intended! I love it! It reminds me of the old infinity bugs xD
That looks like "A8" on the front, not A2. They show up as A8 on eBay. ~$11.50 shipped for something that would have cost government spies thousands of dollars not that long ago. Wonderful, as if government spying isn't enough, any amateur snoop can massively violate privacy for $11.50. Here's the text from one of the eBay ads about this "GPS" device. Notice the mention of "surveillance operation" as the primary intended use of this device: How does it work: It's simple. Your surveillance operation will be underway in 4 simple steps: 1. Insert a mobile phone SIM card in the device (E.G. free PAYG SIM card from O2 etc) 2. Conceal the device where it cant be seen... 3. Dial the pay as you go number from your phone..... 4. Listen - now you can hear what they are really talking about...
Not true. I can build these from scratch. If one has the materials in bulk, it should cost next to nothing compared to the retail price (which includes packaging, labelling, shipping etc) What is considered the latest technology to consumers is pre-approved and is considered almost ancient technology to the government. Much of it is never revealed to the average joe because the average joe can also be a no-good SOB.
Ahhh BigClive we finally saw *you* (as in your head) at 10:00 :D @TQ < It's really not worth wasting your time building one of these out of parts. Assembly along with fine microsoldering will cost you more in time (at least an hour) than it's worth just buying it ready made for only $12usd. Don't get me wrong I'm a huge hobby electronics fan and still built some gadgets by hand, but nowadays mass production has rendered the self-build model a moot point in most cases such as this, therefore due to the Time/Cost/Benefit ratio, it's just not worth building it yourself. ;)
Hey Clive! Love your channel, first of all! And second, could you perhaps do a review/in-depth analysis of the actual GPS tracker you wound up using?That'd be awesome because I'm contemplating putting one of those in my car as a way of tracking it if it ever got stolen.
Depending on how many nearby towers, cell phone tower triangulation can be extremely accurate. If the device can ping 3 towers, then the device can be tracked within a meter. That is a lot of if's tho.
Plus it's got really small low gain antennas which makes it pretty inaccurate. Nowadays they've got plenty of cheap ($20) models with real GPS built in, just check on AliExpress.com ;)
Why? It's literally just a mobile phone? Think about it, a mobile you can use to covertly listen to people, covertly record video or take pictures, you can also use it to track people via the GPS function. There are also apps that copy all keystrokes and send them to you, take remote screenshots, copy + remotely send their texts, emails, time call placed etc etc. Nearly any everyday consumer electronics can be used for covert surveillance, webcams, CCTV, phones, tvs, laptops and there's nothing illegal about such devices even if advertised for surveillance. You might run into problems if you got caught using them somewhere that wasnt your property, but that's completely different from making the devices illegal
I think the difference with this piece of electronic is that it is made purposefully to be a bugging device. If someone finds a cellphone in a drawer which, theoretically, has bugging abilities, you will less likely be prosecuted. If someone found this A8 device in a drawer somewhere, your intent of bugging someone is crystalclear and your defence will be a hard one. Your logic can be easily turned around completely, making everyone who carries one of the electrical devices you mentioned a suspect. The law isn't just logic, it has to be reasonable and fair too in it's decisions.
that unit is great for hacking pull off the arm micro chip wire power ground and tx rx from the pcb to an arduino and you can build a mini gsm with power supply
in my firsth post i explained it take the prosessor out connect a arduino to the rx and tx pins of the gsm chip and then you have an arduino controlled gsm with build in power supply
I bought one of these 6 months ago and gave up on it when I had to pay for the chip as well. I bought a very cheap sim chip but didnt want to activate it not knowing if it could work or what it would do since there is like NO help from manufacturer and the website seemed weird. I threw it into a drawer. Now I see this and might dig it out and throw a few dollars onto that chip.
I wonder if that extra pin is for controlling an external load, like a relay or something. You send a text it turns on, you send a different text it turns off type of thing?
Although not close to the battery leads, I suspect that 8 pin chip is a battery management/charge controller chip. It's rare that a modern cell phone controller chip needs an op-amp for a microphone (that's usually built in an only needs a resistor/capacitor for signal). Also, the controller is not the cell phone module itself - pretty much guaranteed the GSM stuff is under the tin covered area. A GPS tracker could use a processor with far fewer capabilities and the android OS would be overkill because the GSM module does most of the computational work. As an audio bug, I bet the CPU is doing DSP functions to trigger audio spy mode, hence the reason the manufacturer selected that processor and/or they are storing a lot of data on that flash module. As far as the electronics on the LiPo battery, that is typical with most LiPo's (charge protection circuits) - no charge management lead otherwise. Just some thoughts, I could be wrong about some of this - I am no way an expert.
I've a few of both the tracker and listener, when used together they are a powerful surveillance system. The listener works well alone in a room with a power pack, I found the early single 18650 battery ones quite good before they were all recalled. It's a shame they don't take a BL-2 battery. Do you have the instructions for the tracker/a review as I've lost my instructions.
Just recently subbed to your channel. Good stuff, and informative. Also, your voice is like silk blowing in the warm breeze of a fresh spring morning. Ok... A little creepy... Sorry.
9:25 Actually i'm fairly certain the ARM processor uses the other chip you referred to as the "phone" chip as RAM. It should be a memory module. The "phone" part of this device is just software and we've only got a GSM radio underneath the EM shielding.
The MT chip is a CPU mostly used for chinese/junk android phones . MT= Mediatek ## . This is probably a Android running "tablet" without a screen. There are many small android computers with a HDMI port, then you have a android computer.
Gonna make this into a anti theft device for my moped, just bought 2 for experimenting with. When I'm flying my fpv quad, I usually have to walk a few miles/ km to get to quiet spots, and by doing so- I've almost had my moped stolen 2 times now. When I get called, I can hurry back to my moped, with at least a little chance of catching the thieves in person. That, combined with a pinhole camera in my buddyseat, should make attempt of theft a lot less painfull. As I also have a A3 sized printer and laminator- and the sheer willpower of hanging up hundreds of photos xD
You know, you could wire a relay to it to cut power or even wire an inline fuel cock switch to turn off the fuel. I suppose they can lift it up into a truck but they aren't going to ride off on it.
He means PAYG as they don't norm require any personal information to activate (unless your county requires by law that they are tied to your Identity, I know only 3 that do it)
when I watch your videos I feel like I'm back in 5th grade science class, that's a good thing. Can you do a video on a cheap 18650 battery charger because I know they are disasters waiting to happen
so there isn't any sign of GPS circuitry? but it does function as a GSM bug... disappointing, but a great find. ** 2 stars for the device ***** 5 stars for the video
Technically you could narrow down the location of the device using only cell towers, But you need to have a few of the cell towers listed to triangulate against them. While its not GPS which can average around 5 meters, If you can get 4 or more towers (when it reconnects / cycles / moves) then you can some times get around 100 to 500 meters accuracy.. But all this requires processing, eg checking the signal strength vs the towers location and so on.. This is a common fall back when the GPS module itself can not obtain a sat fix, common when in a shed/house/some where that the sky is not visible to the device.. As usual, love the video's clive
+TheWizechatmgr Generically called TK102. I recommend getting a suitable charger for the batteries it takes (usually a generic Nokia cell) and getting at least one spare cell so you can swap in a freshly charged one every morning.
+TheWizechatmgr I know I'm a bit late on this but I'd recommend the tkstar look it up on ebay! it costs a bit more than the TK102 usually priced at about £25 but the battery lasts up to I think about 5 days I use to charge mine every 3 days or so. (Used it for my car) Comes with a app for your phone and everything :D Has live tracking on the app with a decent refresh rate (15 seconds adjustable to your requirement but 15sec is the lowest)
From my understanding cell phone towers need to have very accurate timing so they can manage many phone signals at once by knowing the time delays between phone signals incoming / outgoing. And this rubidium clocks timing lets the tower as well as the phone calculate the distances. When the phone is able to ping two or more towers it can get a good fix on its calculated location, which is what 911 emergency services can use to triangulate the calling cell phone's location to just a few meters knowing nothing more than the location of the cell towers. Your device must be able to tap into or use that servers just like I can with my iPhone. I can click a button in my Apple account on any PC and it will show me where my iPhone is within just a few meters.
***** 2 for any tracking, 3 for near perfect triangulation. With only 2 towers, you have to guess within 2 possible locations, which USUALLY is obvious, if one is a lake and the other is a building for instance.
iPhones have GPS chips built into them, which is why you're seeing such a perfectly accurate location when you log into Find My iPhone. That being said, modern cellular devices use what they call A-GPS, which uses the distance from cell towers to get an approximate location which drastically cuts down the amount of time it takes the real GPS module to get a lock on the satellites. A standalone GPS without this assistance can take several minutes to get a lock, especially if it's been moved far away from its last location where it was previously powered on. With A-GPS, a device can get a lock in seconds, even after being moved across the world.
gadgetboyj Good to know. I once had an old phone which for sure didn't have GPS. It only had a text screen and I had to call 911. The operator asked if I was on the corner of x and y and I was at that exact spot, so they must be able to get a good fix using just the cell tower distance calcs too. At least in a big city with lots of towers.
***** Cell towers know where the device is, but the device does not necessarily know the distance from the towers, it simply keeps to its time slots assigned by the tower. There's currently a protocol, MSA, where the towers and the device share sufficient information to allow the device to usually triangulate itself, but at least in my area, i haven't seen it actually work. Smartphones generally use following information to determine their position: * IDs of connected towers. It can get locations of towers from an Internet service. * IDs of local WLAN base stations which broadcast their name, together with their signal strengths. There's an Internet service (operated by your smartphone's system provider) which returns location based on this list, and it's often scaringly accurate. Where does this service know the location from? Because another smartphone was nearby with its GPS turned on, and determined accurate location corresponding to the WLAN footprint, and sent it to that service. It's easy enough to keep WLAN chipset running in listening mode even when WLAN is not engaged, doesn't consume too much power. * And finally as mentioned by others, GPS. It's not even turned on that often, as it consumes quite a bit of power, unless the phone has no other accurate way to determine the location, or if it wants to know travel direction and travel speed, because GPS is really good at measuring those.
it is a fully capable tracker but the feature may have been disabled. if you get the signal strengths of more than 1 tower you can triangulate the position but there might be laws prohibiting this feature so it may have been gimped to only allow access to a single tower
Maybe the unknown "contact" at the corner is a switch, for detecting tampering with the device. When the case is open, the switch is activated and all memory on the device/SIM card is erased? Or maybe (if not a switch), some kind of connection for an external antenna?
In the USA cell sites have the X Y Z receive inputs split to allow a device with the name True Position added, I think the information then sent back other sites, which by using triangulation gives a location, I have only seen these as I do 2-way radio, but we collocate with cell carriers, it is not GPS but it does work.
The red LED light is it always supposed to be on? mine seems to be. not matter how insignificant it consumes power and does not help the whole "covert" thing
+Chris Roller It should be able to do so, but I'd suggest using an over-rated panel to make sure that it didn't run flat after several dull days. If the voltage falls too low it it might crash or lock-up and not reboot.
+bigclivedotcom That's an excellent idea. I was just pondering ideas for increasing it's longevity. I'm a big fan of charging my devices with solar cells.
3:02 - Regarding non-registered sim, you might still be identified (by say authorities if it came to that) if you are calling it from your own cell phone...even if you use a non-registered sim in your own cell. I could be wrong but I thought your phone's unique IMEI number is transmitted to the cell network each time you make a call from it. You'd have to be careful about that.
MJ D it wasn't like that whrn phones first came out as you know, but people misused throw away phones. I think you gotta register even for a pre paid simcard
+Immortal Depends where you live. In Czech Republic you can buy SIMs even in grocery stores with cash (no registration) and cheap (~$20) cellphones in every electronics store (again, cash, no registration).
I also removed the button. I connected the button contacts to a relay controlled by a pir for making a small handheld anti-theft and so I wanted to know if there was a system to turn on and off SOS via sms.
Pretty neat little device still even though it isn't a GPS tracker. I need something like this for my Grandmother. Since pagers aren't a thing anymore, at least to my knowledge....
I bought several of those known as A GF07 ALSO THERES A GF 09 THAT RETURNS A LOCATION OF THE NEAREST TOWER .. neither works as a GPS. A few of the 07s came in pieces electrically they worked but only would call or could be call but never returned a position.
One could easily mount the board into something like an Altoids tin or a plastic case of some sort, change over to a larger capacity and better quality battery and increase the length of standby and operation by a huge amount. I don't think the Altoids tin would block signal to any huge extent. One COULD do that, if one was interested in eavesdropping a room for a longer period of time. Which would be illegal. And something one should NEVER, EVER do.
Here is the problem with these things in the US. Pay as You Go services "Burner services and phones" like Tracfone and NET10 use a proprietary provisioning system in their sim cards and phones that keeps people from putting their sims in other phones that are sim unlocked or universal or dual sim types. You cant use an AT&T phone with a Tracfone sim or a Tracfone phone with an AT&T sim. Hence this device is useless on most "burner" services in the US that use a sim card. Which is good because it keeps people from bugging homes with a burner sim card in the device. You have to use a contract service sim and no one bugging a house will use a contract sim in their name.
In the US, Ting do prepaid SIMs that don't depend on proprietary features on the phone. Adafruit Industries use them for internet of things applications.
would it be possible to program a gsm sim to work with a service like lookout mobile so you can locate the device? or would it need another microchip on the arm to locate the sim this way? Im gonna try to figure out if this can be done with a freedom pop chip. thanks if you save me some research.
Could I just cut off that battery and replace it with another, bigger capacity lithium battery? Would it then be able to charge that bigger battery fully? Given that the bigger battery also has a circuit protection module
Hello big Clive! I sadly brought a mini A8 to track my grandad when he goes walk about and gets lost. Glad it only cost £10! I've now brought the TK102 as you sold it to me when reading your website! I was wondering if you knew how much data you used? I've brought a giffgaff sim and brought a £10 goodie bag which comes with 1gb of Internet and the messages and minutes. Or does it just use top up like mentioned in your post?
They should implement a "circuit fryer" circuit that has a high-capacity capacitor which would fry the SIM whenever the cover is opened if "stealth mode" was activated.
+Martin Counsell I wondered if the springloaded pjn was an antitamper device, so it would know if its been taken apart maybe? seeing as it could be used for spying, you'd want to know if you've been found out too.. or is that too James Bond lol
If it stores the number that called it then it can be traced back to that number. OK if that is a pay as you go but not if on contract. I have seen adverts in the past that state that you can find your wallet or pet. When separated from you a signal is sent with the location. That would be great, but have you ever known a dog to stay in one place or a wallet to remain where it was found?
The larger Tracker device is excellent. It is far simpler to set up. If a mother wished to know where their child is going to or from school they will indeed get an immediate and very accurate location. Ideal too for elderly who may suffer Alzheimers. Very cost effective. All one needs is a SIM Card. That simple. Highly recommended as stated.
I have been looking for something to attach to my drone, Just incase i loose it or something, this was the perfect size when i saw it, but you killed my dreams after seeing your review lol. That would be the perfect size to attach small light.
Wish they had these back in the 80s and early 90s when my mother had Alzheimer's and often wandered off. The Japanese have made great advances in tracking relatives with dementia and now have implantable devices; that probably sounds dystopian and scary to anyone who has no experience of dementia,
I think the spring that contact to the case maybe so kind of reset or some clear data button like for if some one found this and want open the case it will clear it self.
That's interesting. We're looking for the video version of that to send up to near space in a balloon. We figure we can get back the images through gsm when it gets close enough to a tower...
I really like the idea,sadly belgium just put up a law every sim card subscription and prepaid needs to be registerd with a eID before it can be used...
I think most prepaid services cannot receive calls when they don't have credit/active service. I know this is the case with Straight Talk (MVNO service in the USA owned by Tracfone)
If you call this in the uk and listen remotely then your committing a criminal offence if you leave it in a private residence or workplace. Not so sure about public places. Use with caution or your going to jail.
