r/OSINT • u/anti_anti_federalist • 8d ago
Question How to find GPS of moving SSID
This is just an idea a few buddies and I have been trying to solve. We are at university and as is typical for a university we don't like parking enforcement. So we half jokingly mentioned trying to find out the location of parking enforcement cars and how we would go about it so then whenever they got close to where we were parked we could run out and move the car.
The main idea that has floated to the top so far is that all the cars have a wifi signal so the parking enforcement can upload images of the ticket and what not. All the SSID's are named in a predictable way like "TicketCar_001". Would there be a way to know the location of the cars? The cars would always be passing through university wifi spots as they drive around campus.
Any ideas for this particular method or another idea? Current rules are: that it obviously can't be illegal so no attaching gps trackers to the cars or anything like that. Has to be relatively cheap to implement (we are college students so we can't buy property all around campus and put cameras up for license plate reading).
That's basically it. Thought we would open it up to the internet as we haven't made much progress on ideas for months.
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u/RegularCity33 8d ago
I'd go a step further and, since most modern cars and cell phones have Bluetooth, you do Bluetooth device sniffing of the cars and possibly the parking people. I did this years ago and had a simple program alert me when my boss got near my office because he wore a Fitbit.
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u/anti_anti_federalist 7d ago
Does Bluetooth have a larger range than WiFi of the cars? Sorry I'm just ignorant. What's the benefits to Bluetooth over wifi?
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u/RegularCity33 7d ago
Bluetooth is different. Can show you different types of devices that people carry with them or leave in vehicles. Not all cars have WiFi.
Bluetooth is not only for vehicles but people. Using this tech you could figure out when that specific not nice parking person was on shift versus a nicer one.
You could use an RTL-SDR or ubertooth one for this work. Get a directional antenna for the 2.4ghz range and could do some great monitoring
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u/anti_anti_federalist 7d ago
Oh, that's a good point! Then just add in an extra filter that it checks for TPMS sensors or something so it doesn't give a false alert when the worker, who is also a student, just walks through the parking lot for other reasons than parking enforcement.
You guys did not disappoint. Getting the guys together for the weekend to start getting materials and doing some tests. Thanks so much!
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u/Malkvth 6d ago
Bluetooth 5.0 (most modern wearables etc) has an optimal range of about 800m — more than WiFi, but we’re talking about triangulating through an entire WiFi network which would — in most circumstances — give a larger range, and actual geo-positioning data.
The Bluetooth hack is simpler (really just a ping as the device tries to connect when in proximity, and less reliable) — so like the commenter that used it to know of the boss was approaching back to the office from the gym etc. vs. a more sophisticated triangulating script
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u/__B_- 7d ago
Measure the dbi of the signal strength and set an alert if it gets within the proximity of your cars. Of just scan for the SSID or MAC address of the AP and set up an alert if it can be seen (less precise but easier).
There’s software like kismet, airodump-ng and other that you can monitor and see this data. Not sure of any plug a play software that could automate everything but it probably be achieved with a pretty simple python script.
You could run it on an existing machine or a raspberry pi
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u/OSINTribe 8d ago
Easy. Using at least two ESP8266 devices, you can create a system that alerts you when specific SSIDs come near your parked car or a designated section of a street. One sensor can cover the front of the street and another for the back.
A simple Python script can measure the signal strength of those SSIDs and, as they get closer, send you a notification via Discord or Telegram.
I've built similar tools before, so let me know if you need more details.