Amazing possibilities with Bluetooth tracking

onway has supported a research project being conducted at the Eastern Switzerland University of Applied Sciences on the topic of “Bluetooth Tracking”. As part of their Bachelor’s thesis, two students investigated what tracking possibilities are afforded by today’s Bluetooth applications. The results are astounding. Firstly, many “wearables” – such as commonly used Bluetooth headphones or smartwatches – allow owners to be tracked for days and weeks. Furthermore, widely used Covid apps as well as apps for finding devices and people (e.g. “FindMy”) also make it possible to track the presence of Bluetooth devices, such as when travelling by public transport. This means that, in addition to known passenger count methods using our WLAN routers, it is now also possible to trace passengers’ travel routes (i.e. the customer journey) by detecting Bluetooth devices – it goes without saying that this always occurs in compliance with data protection regulations.