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Main Area and Open Discussion => Living Room => Topic started by: Tinman57 on August 06, 2013, 07:15 PM

Title: Anti-Tracking Smartphone Pouch
Post by: Tinman57 on August 06, 2013, 07:15 PM: This isn't an ad, but an article warning about government snoopers.

Anti-tracking smartphone pouch is a sign of the times
Are you the type the tapes over the camera on your MacBook? If so, you might also want to store your iPhone in a radio-free pouch when it's not in use. Big brother is watching.

http://www.zdnet.com/anti-tracking-smartphone-pouch-is-a-sign-of-the-times-7000019010
Title: Re: Anti-Tracking Smartphone Pouch
Post by: 40hz on August 07, 2013, 03:26 PM: Wonder if it actually does work as well as claimed? I don't think they've had any independent confirmation of their claims - but I could be wrong.

Of course since the NSA can easily monitor who supported the kickstarter and got one - plus who buys one once they become commercially available (ain't debit and credit cards a grand thing?), it's kinda moot. Besides, any phone that regularly drops off the grid and can't be reached by a backchannel ping - and then pops back for no apparent reason - becomes a dead giveaway that the owner is employing some shielding mechanism.

That should be enough to get you on a list of phone owners targeted for 'heightened' scrutiny...

That's the insidious part what's going on. It's not a technical fix we need. We need to address and deal with the people and power issue here. And get it resolved definitively. Otherwise it becomes a game of "whack-a-mole" as somebody characterized it. It'll never end if we only try to deal with the technology and not the attitudes and motivations behind this government's blanket and effectively unsupervised surveillance agenda.
Title: Re: Anti-Tracking Smartphone Pouch
Post by: Tinman57 on August 07, 2013, 03:59 PM: Then again, it's much cheaper just to pull the battery out of your phone when not in use, and they can't make that against the law. If the battery isn't removeable, wrap that sucker in tin foil! :P
Title: Re: Anti-Tracking Smartphone Pouch
Post by: Stoic Joker on August 07, 2013, 05:20 PM: Besides, any phone that regularly drops off the grid and can't be reached by a backchannel ping - and then pops back for no apparent reason - becomes a dead giveaway that the owner is employing some shielding mechanism.
-40hz (August 07, 2013, 03:26 PM)

Bingo! (As usual...) Then they look at where the phone appeared and based on where it disappeared, and the time it was off ... calculate the most likely point what was hidden. Doesn't take too many tries to narrow it down either I'd wager.
Title: Re: Anti-Tracking Smartphone Pouch
Post by: Renegade on August 07, 2013, 07:23 PM: Besides, any phone that regularly drops off the grid and can't be reached by a backchannel ping - and then pops back for no apparent reason - becomes a dead giveaway that the owner is employing some shielding mechanism.
-40hz (August 07, 2013, 03:26 PM)

Bingo! (As usual...) Then they look at where the phone appeared and based on where it disappeared, and the time it was off ... calculate the most likely point what was hidden. Doesn't take too many tries to narrow it down either I'd wager.
-Stoic Joker (August 07, 2013, 05:20 PM)

As long as you're not silly enough to constantly go back to where you buried the bodies, it should be ok. :P

Kinda makes you wonder whether it's worth having the hassle of a phone at all anymore.
Title: Re: Anti-Tracking Smartphone Pouch
Post by: Tinman57 on August 07, 2013, 07:59 PM: Kinda makes you wonder whether it's worth having the hassle of a phone at all anymore.
-Renegade (August 07, 2013, 07:23 PM)

You got that right. I've always hated phones, it was nice whenever I left the house to go somewhere I also got away from the phone. I have a cell now, but only because of my family if they should have an emergency.

I've been thinking about going to the Walmart throw-away phones. The NSA don't know who you are even if they were tracking the phone. ;D
Title: Re: Anti-Tracking Smartphone Pouch
Post by: Renegade on August 07, 2013, 08:20 PM: I've been thinking about going to the Walmart throw-away phones. The NSA don't know who you are even if they were tracking the phone. ;D
-Tinman57 (August 07, 2013, 07:59 PM)

You've hit a sore spot for me... I'm pretty bitter & resentful that everywhere I've lived has forced me to produce a passport in order to get a chip just to talk to people. I've been bitter about this for years and it still pisses me off. You're lucky in the US there if you don't have to... I'm going to stop there before I degenerate into a babbling puddle of boiling profanities and steaming vulgarity...
Title: Re: Anti-Tracking Smartphone Pouch
Post by: 40hz on August 07, 2013, 09:12 PM: You've hit a sore spot for me... I'm pretty bitter & resentful that everywhere I've lived has forced me to produce a passport in order to get a chip just to talk to people. I've been bitter about this for years and it still pisses me off. You're lucky in the US there if you don't have to...
-Renegade (August 07, 2013, 08:20 PM)

Yet. :-\
Title: Re: Anti-Tracking Smartphone Pouch
Post by: Renegade on August 07, 2013, 09:15 PM: You've hit a sore spot for me... I'm pretty bitter & resentful that everywhere I've lived has forced me to produce a passport in order to get a chip just to talk to people. I've been bitter about this for years and it still pisses me off. You're lucky in the US there if you don't have to...
-Renegade (August 07, 2013, 08:20 PM)

Yet. :-\
-40hz (August 07, 2013, 09:12 PM)

Sigh... :(

"Free speech" doesn't mean that you can't say whatever you want... you can... just as long as we know who you are, where you are, and what you're saying...
Title: Re: Anti-Tracking Smartphone Pouch
Post by: Tinman57 on August 08, 2013, 08:12 PM: "Free speech" doesn't mean that you can't say whatever you want... you can... just as long as we know who you are, where you are, and what you're saying...
-Renegade (August 07, 2013, 09:15 PM)

That pretty much sums it up.... :mad:
Title: Re: Anti-Tracking Smartphone Pouch
Post by: TaoPhoenix on August 08, 2013, 08:18 PM: "Free speech" doesn't mean that you can't say whatever you want... you can... just as long as we know who you are, where you are, and what you're saying...
-Renegade (August 07, 2013, 09:15 PM)

That pretty much sums it up.... :mad:
-Tinman57 (August 08, 2013, 08:12 PM)

In that vein, there was a particularly (and prob accidentally) unsubtle error message I got today.

"In order to use Yahoo mail, turn Private Browsing off in Safari".

I'll deliver that one straight-face and let y'all do the antics!
Title: Re: Anti-Tracking Smartphone Pouch
Post by: Renegade on August 08, 2013, 11:38 PM: In that vein, there was a particularly (and prob accidentally) unsubtle error message I got today.

"In order to use Yahoo mail, turn Private Browsing off in Safari".

I'll deliver that one straight-face and let y'all do the antics!
-TaoPhoenix (August 08, 2013, 08:18 PM)

:'( :o Speechless.
Title: Re: Anti-Tracking Smartphone Pouch
Post by: 4wd on August 09, 2013, 01:19 AM: Not very forward thinking of the designers, they should have covered the 7xx MHz frequencies also.
Title: Re: Anti-Tracking Smartphone Pouch
Post by: 40hz on August 13, 2013, 07:52 AM: Nice to see somebody else going along with my earlier comment that this isn't a tech issue were dealing with - it's a people problem. (Even if I would never use such a horrible made-up word like 'solutionism.') ;D

From Jatan Sadowski over at Wired (http://www.wired.com/opinion/2013/08/yah-surveillance-sucks-but-technology-isnt-the-only-solution/):

...Because there are two separate — yet often entangled — ideologies in our discourse about the surveillance state: The first is the individualistic conception of cyber-hygiene: how you should behave to secure your own communications, protect your own data, and avoid your own tracking. The second is the notion of tech-centric solutionism (a term popularized by Evgeny Morozov): what tech hack, device, or app can I turn to for a quick fix to my privacy troubles?

The problem is that focusing on one or both of these approaches distracts from the much-needed political reform and societal pushback necessary to dig up a surveillance state at its root...

8)
Title: Re: Anti-Tracking Smartphone Pouch
Post by: Stoic Joker on August 13, 2013, 11:16 AM: Well if "Nothing to hide" is their justification for this crap...I think we should get a few million people together and show up at the Whitehouse completely naked.

We put all the 300+ pounders we can find in the front rows ... And carry signs that say we'll get dressed when you stop being so F'ing nosey!!
Title: Re: Anti-Tracking Smartphone Pouch
Post by: Renegade on August 13, 2013, 11:59 AM: Well if "Nothing to hide" is their justification for this crap...I think we should get a few million people together and show up at the Whitehouse completely naked.

We put all the 300+ pounders we can find in the front rows ... And carry signs that say we'll get dressed when you stop being so F'ing nosey!!
-Stoic Joker (August 13, 2013, 11:16 AM)

"Nothing to hide? What'd you say? Nothing to hide? I'll... Stop resisting. I said STOP RESISTING!" <thud> <whack> <k-pow> <oomph> "STOP RESISTING!" <bang> <bzzzt> "How's it now resisting the tase? Huh?" <bzzt> <aarrrgghhh!> "Hey, this one stopped resisting." "Is he breathing?" "Like I said, he stopped resisting." "Ok. I'll call the morgue to pick 'em up."

Great site - Photography Is Not A Crime:

http://photographyisnotacrime.com/

It's just bizarre how it's ok for the state to have this massive surveillance of people's public and private lives, and yet if regular people take a picture or video in public, somehow they're criminals?

I can perfectly well imagine the naked march there, and some cops opening fire as the first fatty in front reaches to scratch his butt some. "I thought he was going for his gun." Jokes about it being in front and not behind aside, I really don't think that's out of the question anymore, and I don't think I'd be very surprised to see a story like that.

Oh... I just had a horrific thought... I don't think I want to see that march you've proposed on YouTube...

Nice to see somebody else going along with my earlier comment that this isn't a tech issue were dealing with - it's a people problem.
-40hz (August 13, 2013, 07:52 AM)

As far as I can see, the "people problem" at its root is a "busy body won't mind his own bloody business" problem. At the core, the utterance, "People should not <do something>," is the core problem. A better utterance is, "I should <do something>." e.g. "leave other people alone".
Title: Re: Anti-Tracking Smartphone Pouch
Post by: MyungCalvert on August 23, 2013, 05:09 AM: As you know that the mobile phone signal jammer can cut off the signals of the mobile phones and soon make it impossible to make phone calls or send messages. In this way when you need the peaceful condition and want to stay in it, you can just use the best mobile phone jammer to help you achieve your goal. And now as the technology develops with high speed the advanced 4g cell jammer has come into the market and are well welcomed by the group of people who need the jammer product.
Title: Re: Anti-Tracking Smartphone Pouch
Post by: TaoPhoenix on August 23, 2013, 06:22 AM: "Nothing to hide? What'd you say? Nothing to hide? I'll... Stop resisting. I said STOP RESISTING!" <thud> <whack> <k-pow> <oomph> "STOP RESISTING!" <bang> <bzzzt> "How's it now resisting the tase? Huh?" <bzzt> <aarrrgghhh!> "Hey, this one stopped resisting." "Is he breathing?" "Like I said, he stopped resisting." "Ok. I'll call the morgue to pick 'em up."

Great site - Photography Is Not A Crime:

http://photographyisnotacrime.com/

It's just bizarre how it's ok for the state to have this massive surveillance of people's public and private lives, and yet if regular people take a picture or video in public, somehow they're criminals?
-Renegade (August 13, 2013, 11:59 AM)

Yep.

I'll also give you the topic of "Bait Car". Not that it's a good thing, but let's say in the old days you have an auto theft charge, you do six months, and then move to a new area - except employment hiring, no one really knows you have a past. But look! Now you have yourself emblazoned on a TV show made to be laughed at! (And copyrighted to them!) Now you can't go anywhere without being pegged.

But check out the front notice of the show: "All people in this show are innocent until proven guilty"!

Yep, like you said, do some civilian recording of the law in action, and no, that's "endangering the officer".

However, the real innovations in tech haven't quite percolated yet. If you do the "guy recording with phone pose", stuff happens. But get a cheap baseball hat and Chinese non-Google video glasses maybe with an "angle tilter", then you can sit in a cafe reading a book but the actual recording angle is the traffic stop outside your window! You're not facing them, so you must be a good little citizen, right?
Title: Re: Anti-Tracking Smartphone Pouch
Post by: bit on December 09, 2013, 02:14 PM: This hardcase (http://www.privacycase.com/) seems interesting, but pricey.
I thought I read somewhere that if you wrap your cell phone in aluminum foil, it will keep trying to check for incoming calls and run its own battery down in a short time.
Or is that not so?
Title: Re: Anti-Tracking Smartphone Pouch
Post by: tomos on December 09, 2013, 04:41 PM: ^ I used have a cloth carry-bag that completely blocked the phone - it didnt cause any problem with the phone. (In case relevant: the phone wasn't used for internet.)

Might it also depend on the phone model though?
Title: Re: Anti-Tracking Smartphone Pouch
Post by: bit on December 09, 2013, 10:46 PM: That's what they mean by 'digital'.
Using your 'digits' to dial numbers. :P
Title: Re: Anti-Tracking Smartphone Pouch
Post by: mwb1100 on December 10, 2013, 01:59 AM: Besides, any phone that regularly drops off the grid and can't be reached by a backchannel ping - and then pops back for no apparent reason - becomes a dead giveaway that the owner is employing some shielding mechanism.
-40hz (August 07, 2013, 03:26 PM)

This technique has been used by Hezbollah to uncover American spies. Using off-the-shelf technology available to anyone.

The analysis identified cellphones that, for instance, were used rarely or always from specific locations and only for a short period of time.
-http://gizmodo.com/5861384/hezbollah-captured-american-spies-by-tracking-cellphone-data-with-commercially-available-software

Of course, they had suspicions already and had ideas of where to perform the data captures effectively so it's not like they were mining data from the entire cell network. But it's a good indication of how easy this kind of thing can be and how this behavior can be a 'tell'.
Title: Re: Anti-Tracking Smartphone Pouch
Post by: Innuendo on December 10, 2013, 09:56 AM: I thought I read somewhere that if you wrap your cell phone in aluminum foil, it will keep trying to check for incoming calls and run its own battery down in a short time.
Or is that not so?
-bit (December 09, 2013, 02:14 PM)

Cell phones are designed to reach out and find cell phone towers so they can maintain connections with the mobile network. If they can't make contact they'll keep trying to reach out over and over again until the battery dies. This is why if you are in a remote area with spotty cell phone service your battery will drain more quickly. In this aluminum foil scenario what you would want to do is turn on Airplane Mode before you wrapped your phone.
Title: Re: Anti-Tracking Smartphone Pouch
Post by: 40hz on December 10, 2013, 10:17 AM: I was just wondering...do they come in colors designed "just for women (https://www.donationcoder.com/forum/index.php?topic=36730.msg343905;topicseen#msg343905)" too? ;D
Title: Re: Anti-Tracking Smartphone Pouch
Post by: Innuendo on December 10, 2013, 03:56 PM: I was just wondering...do they come in colors designed "just for women (https://www.donationcoder.com/forum/index.php?topic=36730.msg343905;topicseen#msg343905)" too? ;D
-40hz (December 10, 2013, 10:17 AM)

Of course they do...and with an extra pocket to keep your favorite lipstick!
Title: Re: Anti-Tracking Smartphone Pouch
Post by: SeraphimLabs on December 10, 2013, 04:22 PM: Those walmart disposable phones work rather well.

Mind you, if they want to know who is holding it all they have to do is pull the records of it and then get IDs from the people you talk to. Its not hard to fill in the gaps in a social network, even for an antisocial person.

If you ask me though, the iphone with its permanently fixed battery is a fire hazard. Lithium packs can and do explode after all, and should be required to have a method to quickly eject them in order to spare the device's contents.
Title: Re: Anti-Tracking Smartphone Pouch
Post by: Innuendo on December 11, 2013, 10:44 AM: If you ask me though, the iphone with its permanently fixed battery is a fire hazard. Lithium packs can and do explode after all, and should be required to have a method to quickly eject them in order to spare the device's contents.
-SeraphimLabs (December 10, 2013, 04:22 PM)

Don't get me started. I've been of the opinion for years that Apple is trying to move their entire product line to appliance-like device architectures. They'd love to move to a no-user-serviceable parts manufacturing system and if your shiny Apple product breaks (or bursts into flame) there's no repair option or if you want to add more RAM or storage space there's no upgrade path. You would have to buy a new iThing.
Title: Re: Anti-Tracking Smartphone Pouch
Post by: J-Mac on December 11, 2013, 09:27 PM: My Droid Razr has a non-removable battery too. I just keep it under my hat (Which, of course, is made from tin foil... :P )

Jim
Title: Re: Anti-Tracking Smartphone Pouch
Post by: bit on January 28, 2014, 02:12 AM: I thought I read somewhere that if you wrap your cell phone in aluminum foil, it will keep trying to check for incoming calls and run its own battery down in a short time.
Or is that not so?
-bit (December 09, 2013, 02:14 PM)

Cell phones are designed to reach out and find cell phone towers so they can maintain connections with the mobile network. If they can't make contact they'll keep trying to reach out over and over again until the battery dies. This is why if you are in a remote area with spotty cell phone service your battery will drain more quickly. In this aluminum foil scenario what you would want to do is turn on Airplane Mode before you wrapped your phone.
-Innuendo (December 10, 2013, 09:56 AM)
I've never owned a cell phone so I just don't know these things.
I've read often enough about LEOs having the right to search your laptop or cell phone at will or at random...
1. How are they supposed to know you even have a cell phone if it's in your pocket and you're pulled over?
I mean, do they say, "Do you have a cell phone we can search?" and you obligingly say, "Oh yes, and I don't want you to know that, but I certainly do and it's right here in my coat pocket."
2. Is it possible to set up the cell phone so it never saves phone numbers, incoming or outgoing call recoreds, or text messages, IOW so it contains no useful information, so you can just keep the numbers written down?
Then you could change the same decimal point of number in all phone numbers by one digit up or down, a general 'rule' to keep anyone from getting accurate information out of you, for your real paper note pad of written numbers.
Title: Re: Anti-Tracking Smartphone Pouch
Post by: 40hz on January 28, 2014, 06:11 AM: 1. How are they supposed to know you even have a cell phone if it's in your pocket and you're pulled over?
-bit (January 28, 2014, 02:12 AM)

"They" don't - although with near universal ownership these days, it's a fairly safe assumption that most people are carrying one.

I mean, do they say, "Do you have a cell phone we can search?" and you obligingly say, "Oh yes, and I don't want you to know that, but I certainly do and it's right here in my coat pocket."

They can and do say that - and here's where it gets complicated because:

a) You do (at least for now) have the constitutional right (in the US) to refuse to talk to the police.

b) However, if you do talk to the police, you cannot legally make a false or potentially misleading statement (i.e. lie) to them. That's a criminal offence. So if you say anything at all to the police, it needs to be truthful - and is best done only with an attorney present.

A common police ploy is to trip you up by getting you to say something insignificant but obviously untrue and use that as an excuse to detain or arrest you. Without your attorney present, a court will only have your version and the police version of what you said to them. In in absence of an attorney, the police version of what was said will prevail in court.

c) Refusing to speak to the police is always your safest bet as well as your constitutional right. HOWEVER in some jurisdictions, police have begun to assert (and some judges agree) that legally refusing to talk to the police establishes grounds for suspicion (i.e. probable cause) - and in a few extreme cases, can be considered tantamount to an admission of guilt!

That's a very scary development. Fortunately, it's been largely confined to places where the police are already out of control and the courts seem reluctant to rein them in. Time will tell if it becomes more commonplace in the former 'Land of the Free.'

------------------------

Spend about 45 minutes watching this video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d-7o9xYp7eE) by Regent Law professor James Duane. It may be the best time investment anybody could make in light of what's going on in the good old USA these days.

8)
Title: Re: Anti-Tracking Smartphone Pouch
Post by: bit on January 28, 2014, 01:22 PM: Yes, that is a very informative video which I have seen previously and find very excellent, thank you very much.
"The US Constitution does not 'grant' citizen rights, so much as it 'limits' government powers"; am I right?
Which would mean to me -unless I'm missing the point somehow- that a so-called 'Constitution-free zone' would mean that the officer has no police powers, not that the citizen has no rights.
Not that it really is a 'Consttitution-free zone', just that they claim it is by spouting a lot of legalistic-sounding nonsense.
But go figure.

I did wonder if they actually ask if you have a cell phone, or how precisely do they find out you have a cell phone.
So they ask, 'Do you have a cell phone', you can say you refuse to answer.

At that point, they don't know if you have a cell phone, and since we're discussing a random stop, I suppose their only way to get their hands on it is to turn a 'stop & question' into a 'stop & frisk'.

That's where I got to wondering, why keep all that data on a device that can be surrendered so easily.
Is there a way to program the cell phone so it never saves incoming or outgoing numbers, contacts, messages, or texts, and so on.

Then one simply keeps a few numbers in one's head, or written down on paper.
From my POV, it does not seem so inconvenient, as I do not yet even own a cell phone; but I suppose for the person who is an habitual one-button caller and memorizes or writes down nothing, my idea may seem too unworkable.

I wonder if they use hard-wired connectors to connect to and copy a cell phone or is it done wirelessly?
Maybe you could make up or buy a 'jumper cable' adapter about two inches long, that has an oddball size at one end, and is permanently glued into the cell phone, so that without a matching jumper cable adapter to readapt it to common civilian or police plug sizes you cannot copy the phone's contents.
And of course your matching adapter is at home or misplaced under the car seat rug.

Seriously, with all the innovations in different plugs, I should imagine there must be quite a number of oddball or misfit plug sizes out there -worldwide- that with a protracted search one might come up with something truly difficult to match up.
Presuming a wireless connection is not possible, which I'm not certain.

Or I suppose someone may say to just encrypt the data in the cell phone somehow.
Or you could just epoxy the cell phone socket so nobody can ever plug into it at all.
Or if you have a steel case for your phone with a combination padlock on it, in a shoulder bag; can they order you to unlock the case?
IOW, if you must legally surrender your cell phone to be copied, why make it easy for them; why not interpose physical barriers which you are not legally obliged to help them overcome?

But I do seem to remember seeing a movie in which the cell phone number was copied wirelessly somehow.
Title: Re: Anti-Tracking Smartphone Pouch
Post by: bit on January 28, 2014, 11:54 PM: If the cell phone is in my pocket, and the LEOs know it's in my pocket, seems to me they have to overcome the legal barriers to searching me in order to get at the cell phone in the first place.
IOW, how can they say 'Hand over your cell phone' if they have no legitimate excuse to search me?
There's another 'know your rights' or 'how to deal with police encounters' video, which says that when they 'ask' if they can search your bag, you say 'No, am I under arrest or can I go now?'.
You do not wimp out and say 'Yes' and cave in for no reason.

So if the cell phone is known to be in your bag, or your pocket, why can't you just say 'No' if they want to get their hands on the cell phone and download its data?

It's almost to me, like, they say, "Can I search your bag?"
"No, thank you." Or maybe, "I respectfully decline." Or just a flat "No."
"Then give me your cell phone."
"Sorry, it's in my bag (or pocket)."

IOW, gaining access to the cell phone involves gaining access to my bag, which I have a right to deny access to.
In fact, even if they say, "Do you have a cell phone in your bag?" I can decline to answer and refuse to allow permission to search the bag or myself.

I'm just enormously curious because I've never owned a cell phone and currently have no intention of getting one, and I hear all these stories.
Title: Re: Anti-Tracking Smartphone Pouch
Post by: J-Mac on January 29, 2014, 12:06 AM: I'm just enormously curious because I've never owned a cell phone and currently have no intention of getting one, and I hear all these stories.
-bit (January 28, 2014, 11:54 PM)

Well you sure are spending a lot of words for something that you don’t own and have no intention of owning! Why all the concern?

Just curious.

Jim
Title: Re: Anti-Tracking Smartphone Pouch
Post by: bit on January 29, 2014, 01:52 AM: I'm just enormously curious because I've never owned a cell phone and currently have no intention of getting one, and I hear all these stories.
-bit (January 28, 2014, 11:54 PM)

Well you sure are spending a lot of words for something that you don’t own and have no intention of owning! Why all the concern?

Just curious.

Jim
-J-Mac (January 29, 2014, 12:06 AM)
Actually, I have thought about getting a cell phone.
I suppose the only time a LEO might search a cell phone is at a mass transit security checkpoint like an airport terminal.
So just being pulled over on the road, or approached in a mall, doesn't seem to represent any such possibility.
If it's in my bag, and I refuse to allow a bag search, they'd have to make it an order.
I would want to know in advance what rights I can insist on.
Like they say, if you don't know your rights, you don't have any.
Thus my curiousity here with all the questions.

Or like I say, there may be ways to interpose passive physical or software obstructions to them gaining your data that are not illegal, and could be remarkably difficult for them to overcome.

When you delete any info from a cell phone, is it still there, or is it really gone and irretrievable?
Perhaps I could just make a habit of hitting 'delete' after every call.

BTW, I said I was thinking of getting a cell phone, not planning to.
I suppose I could just ask a friend or relative. Thank you.