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Is GPS private?
(lemmy.ml)
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this post was submitted on 02 Mar 2026
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What about GPS devices that are not phones
It depends on the device.
If the device requires an account and uploads data to the cloud, it's almost certain that they are recording your location (plus likely a heap of other sensor data). GPS receivers are in a lot of devices that are designed to track your location (like like smart watches, fitness trackers, cars, handheld GPS, PLBs, and so on). The tracking is often a key feature we want for our own benefit, we just don't want or need that data to be used against us by advertisers and governments.
If you have a device that only receives GPS and has no wifi, bluetooth, or other radio or network connection, and doesn't use a cloud account, then perhaps that device doesn't track your location. I'd bet that there aren't that many of those on the market though.
I have a Garmin gps for my car, it does have wifi and bluetooth but my hope is that it's enough that I have these disabled in the settings and never used them to connect to anything.
These are fine. If you got an older garmin with no network connectivity, it's completely passive and only receiving.