How does Brown University know where you are?
What was Brown’s basis for these accusations?
In an interview with The Brown Daily Herald, University Spokesperson Brian Clark said the University evaluated a variety indicators, including:
1 indications of building access,
2 indications of accessing private electronic services,
3 indications of accessing secure networks, and
4 reports from community members.
The mechanics of that last indicator are pretty self-explanatory, but what about the others? Canvas doesn’t Want To Know Your Location. In this post, I’m going to break down the technical mechanisms behind each of these indicators.
For the most part, I do not have insider knowledge on how Brown reached its decisions. Rather, I’m going to consider each of the indicators Brian Clark named, and describe the technical mechanisms to which Brown could have availed itself to generating location data.
