That’s true for some types of signal boosters, especially the simple passive ones. But many building systems aren’t just passive repeaters — they use distributed antenna systems (DAS) or active repeaters that re-broadcast the signal from outside towers. From the phone’s perspective, those can sometimes look like a new connection point, even though they’re not rogue towers reading data.

So while your point is absolutely right that a normal repeater doesn’t act as a tower or capture phone info, the way modern indoor coverage solutions are implemented can still trigger the same kinds of warnings. That’s why it can be hard to tell apart a harmless booster from something more suspicious.

More information about DAS systems and cellular repeaters, and how they differ, if you’re interested:

🔗 https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Distributed_antenna_system

🔗 https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cellular_repeater

(edit, added Wikipedia links)

2G is shutdown for consumers, it still exists for commercial systems that use it for data reporting (thing gas lines, remote monitoring systems, etc).

Now I don't know what that means for our phones, or which towers still have it. I suspect any consumer phone will simply never be able to connect via 2G,but the tower would still see the phone on 2G.

Network and internet>internet>settings button next to carrier>scroll to bottom

For me it was in my SIM card settings: Network & Internet > SIMs > .

Bottom option was a toggle for "2G network protection".

I think this change needs hardware-specific code changes, so not every device upgraded to Android 15 or newer will have that

Edward Snowden claims the NSA knows how to do it.

https://www.cis.upenn.edu/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/EAS499Honors-IMSICatchersandMobileSecurity-V18F.pdf

I'd recommend searching for other sources to corroborate that story. A website selling Faraday bags telling you that you really need a Faraday bag is hardly a reliable source.

That's not a normal thing, but you're right. I can't rule it out. Some phones may stay connective when off. It may require someone to tamper with them beforehand; maybe remotely while they were still on.

I read this patent at Google https://patents.google.com/patent/EP2680182A1/en and if it's not snakeoil, monitoring the power consumption of phone components seems like a good detection method.

Very interesting, do you happen to know what the hardware it requires is?

What if it was to track an immigrant? Or a pregnant woman seeking an abortion? Or a peaceful protestor? Because those are real examples of this technology being used, as well. Where to you draw the line at when it is or isn't okay to become collateral damage in somebody else's petty power play?

These Stingrays steal data from maybe 1 criminal per usage of the device, and hundreds of nearby innocent people. They are indiscriminate. And no, they don't just delete your data just because you're not relevant to their search; everything they gather on you will be kept, tagged, and stored indefinitely in multiple government agencies' databases.