iPhones have been exposing your unique MAC despite Apple's promises
otherwise
"From the get-go, this feature was useless," researcher says of
feature put into iOS 14.
Three years ago, Apple introduced a privacy-enhancing feature that hid
the Wi-Fi address of iPhones and iPads when they joined a network. On Wednesday, the world learned that the feature has never worked as
advertised. Despite promises that this never-changing address would be
hidden and replaced with a private one that was unique to each SSID,
Apple devices have continued to display the real one, which in turn
got broadcast to every other connected device on the network.
The problem is that a Wi-Fi media access control address--typically
called a media access control address or simply a MAC--can be used to
track individuals from network to network, in much the way a license
plate number can be used to track a vehicle as it moves around a city.
Case in point: In 2013, a researcher unveiled a proof-of-concept
device that logged the MAC of all devices it came into contact with.
The idea was to distribute lots of them throughout a neighborhood or
city and build a profile of iPhone users, including the social media
sites they visited and the many locations they visited each day.
https://arstechnica.com/security/2023/10/iphone-privacy-feature-hiding-wi-fi-macs-has-failed-to-work-for-3-years/
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