A very shocking report has emerged around the world regarding digital privacy and surveillance. Researchers at Germany’s Karlsruhe Institute of Technology have claimed that now even ordinary Wi-Fi routers installed in your home or public places can track you. Know what this technology is… How can Wi-Fi routers track a person without any phone or device? For this, German researchers have developed a special hacking method called ‘BFID’. It takes advantage of ‘beamforming feedback information’ (BFI), a common feature of Wi-Fi. This feature was given in Wi-Fi 5 and later technology so that the router can improve the signal performance. But these signals continuously float in the air without any encryption (security lock). When a person walks across the room, these waves are disrupted, which can be secretly captured by any nearby Wi-Fi device. How accurately can this technology identify a person? For this, researchers prepared ‘radio images’ of human movement using machine learning and AI models. It works just like a camera, but takes images using radio waves instead of light. In a test conducted on 197 people, this system identified people by their gait and body structure with 99.5% accuracy. This means that now it is not necessary to have a smartphone, smartwatch or any electronic device for tracking. This technology can monitor the movements of the human body in the radio waves of Wi-Fi. If Wi-Fi does not know our name, what is the threat to privacy? According to cyber security experts, although Wi-Fi data does not directly reveal your name, attackers can easily reveal your complete identity by linking this tracking data with your old smartphone records or location history. The biggest danger is that in public places, malls or offices you will not even know and someone will be silently monitoring your every activity. This technology can become the biggest threat to political activists, journalists and protesters. What is the solution to avoid this? Researchers have appealed to global tech organizations and regulators to implement stronger privacy protections and encryption in future Wi-Fi standards. Until Wi-Fi signals are encrypted internationally, the only practical solution is to be extremely cautious around public Wi-Fi and use new firmware updates that patch security vulnerabilities.
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