This is not at all alarming.

Garbage cans that track your cellphone as you walk by. I kid you not.

The City of London Corporation has asked a company to stop using recycling bins to track the smartphones of passers-by.

Renew London had fitted devices into 12 "pods", which feature LCD advertising screens, to collect footfall data by logging nearby phones.

Chief executive Kaveh Memari said the company had "stopped all trials in the meantime".

The corporation has taken the issue to the Information Commissioner's Office.

The action follows concerns raised by privacy campaign group Big Brother Watch, after details of the technology used in the bins emerged in the online magazine Quartz.

Somebody thought this would be an ok idea for a city-owned service. Somebody needs to be FIRED and never work in government again, IMHO.

Pull the battery out of your phone unless you're talking on it.

The Phantom