Company Designs "Big Brother Chip" 166
Taco Cowboy writes "Here comes a chip that can pinpoint you in-door and out, it can even tell others on which floor of a building you are located. It's the Broadcom 4752 chip. It takes signals from global navigation satellites, cell phone towers, and Wi-Fi hot spots, coupled with input from gyroscopes, accelerometers, step counters, and altimeters The company calls abilities like this 'ubiquitous navigation,' and the idea is that it will enable a new kind of e-commerce predicated on the fact that shopkeepers will know the moment you walk by their front door, or when you are looking at a particular product, and can offer you coupons at that instant."
but only if (Score:2, Informative)
you have the chip on you - otherwise, piss off
!new (Score:5, Informative)
Japanese mobile phones have had this for a while. Personal navigation apps that can guide you through underground stations and inside buildings using wifi and accelerometers when GPS is unavailable.
Re:Not exactly a new threat, but... (Score:5, Informative)
TFS is highly misleading. The chip doesn't "phone home" or give data to marketers. It is just an integration of existing phone tech to reduce cost and power consumption. Just like current phones any snooping will be software controlled by the vendor.