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Bluejacking

Have you been BlueJacked yet? I haven't but then my mobile phone (Palm Tungsten W) does not have Bluetooth.

BlueJacking is the latest craze for those with Bluetooth enabled mobiles and consists of sending an anonymous message to someone within range of your phone - about 10 meters.

There is a great site BluejackQ that has all the answer tips and questions run by Ellie.

"...using a phone with Bluetooth, you can create a phonebook contact and write a message, eg. 'Hello, you've been BlueJacked', in the 'Name' field. Then you can search for other phones with Bluetooth and send that phonebook contact to them. On their phone, a message will popup saying "'Hello, you've been BlueJacked' has just been received by Bluetooth" or something along those lines. For most 'victims' they will have no idea as to how the message appeared on their phone. So, personalised messages like 'I like your pink top' and the startled expressions that result is where the fun really starts." From What is BlueJacking?

How long then before shops start Bluetoothing messages to you as you walk past their windows or advertising hordings. We have seen suggestions of what this may evolve into in the film Minority Report, another Philip K Dick classic, but I can envisage people beaming spam advertising messages to people in queues, cinemas, inside stores - how about a rival store sending in an undercover operative to BlueJack customers of another store actually inside the rival store.

At traffic lights instead of yobs splashing your windscreen with cheap detergent and a rust cloth you will find hordes of recently legalised immigrants beaming messages to you about getting fit quick or making money in your spare time. Your band doing a gig? Forget fly posting or viral marketing – just Bluetooth students as they come out of college.

And don’t walk through any red light districts as your wife may well find an uncompromising message on your phone that gets you into big trouble at home without you ever realising it was there! Then again this could be used as an excuse! “No idea who that was from darling – I must have been BlueJacked in the pub…”

All it need is some bright spark to build a Bluetooth device that’s range is far greater than the 10 meters the specifications permit, and they could beam spam messages to whole communities.

This will become the next spam frontier, mark my words.

Posted by Simon at November 5, 2003 4:26 AM

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Comments

1 November 9, 2003 8:38 AM Damian

I've tried my bluejacking but no-one in my office was sad enough to have their bluetooth switch on, even enough t610s are the popular choice for a mobile at the mo.