Researchers track commuters using stolen mobile accelerometer data

Charlie Osborne reports:

Security researchers have tracked commuters with over 90 percent accuracy through accelerometer data stolen from Android smartphones.

In a paper describing the research, titled “We Can Track You If You Take the Metro: Tracking Metro Riders Using Accelerometers on Smartphones” (.PDF), a security team hailing from Nanjing University, China say they were able to use motion accelerometers as a side-channel for an attack aimed at tracking users with up to 92 percent accuracy.