Governments work with cellular operators to install a surveillance layer, which tracks and records the exact location and movement of all users’ cell phones, all at once, even when they are idle.

http://www.trueposition.com/web/guest/trueposition-location-intelligence

The TruePosition Location Platform (TPLP) is used to provide the real-time, high-accuracy location of target mobile subscribers TruePosition LOCINT is implemented as a passive overlay within a wireless mobile network operator’s existing communications network. Using non-intrusive interfaces with the signaling links, the system extracts location information for all mobile phones of the monitored network.

http://www.trueposition.com/web/guest/u-tdoa

U-TDOA determines a mobile phone’s location by comparing the times at which a cell signal reaches multiple Location Measurement Units (LMUs) installed at the operator’s base stations.

http://truepositionss.virtual.vps-host.net/products/

The TruePosition Location Platform is widely deployed in the United Sates to support the mission-critical E9-1-1 emergency service, and can incorporate multiple location technologies including TruePosition’s patented Uplink Time Difference of Arrival (U-TDOA) location technology.

This technology can support emergency call response, but the tracking systems used are more powerful than what would be needed for this purpose alone. They are designed to support military and police intelligence, and can record and store the movements of all users over a long period of time. Big brother can then select target users for investigation based on their patterns of movement and cell phone usage.

For example, big brother could identify the people who meet with known peace activists or political rivals, look for common meeting places, and disrupt meetings or capture participants. They could track a target user until he might travel to a less populated area, then dispatch someone or something to capture or kill him.

Many people carry mobile phones with them more or less all the time, and few people are aware of this surveillance technology. Normally such surveillance is illegal without a warrant, and it may be difficult for police or others to get such a warrant. This technology tracks every cell phone user simultaneously, without any warrant, and records the history of their movement. It should not be allowed.

I would like to know whether this TruePosition technology or similar is used in Australia, the UK, Europe, or the USA, which networks are using it, and which may not be. One supposed application is emergency service response, which sounds innocuous, so I suspect the technology may have already been widely deployed.

http://www.trueposition.com/web/guest/press-releases?…..

https://ssd.eff.org/wire/protect/cell-tracking