Thank for sharing

They don’t have mobile client. There is OpenWrt One router by OpenWrt and another is Gl.inet that uses OpenWrt.

Interesting… Which VPN are u using? If you don’t mind telling! I am using Mullvad.

I am not saying app is smart. There is an app called “Where is my train” in my country, which works on the same principle i mentioned earlier. https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.whereismytrain.android No need to have internet access or gps enabled. Just need to be on the train and based on your signal strength to the tower you are connected, it will determine location of the train.

I am not running split tunneling. Split tunnel isn’t going to work as i have enabled “block connection without vpn”. In order for split tunneling to wo, this setting need to be turned off.

Edit: It is possible that, as i am running a regular android, some traffic are getting bypassed, which has proven in past that android leaks traffic when vpn is connected https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/google/android-leaks-some-traffic-even-when-always-on-vpn-is-enabled/

Yes… Switching to firmware like OpenWrt and doing the stuff mentioned by Naomi, can help mitigate

Yes… Same principle

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Your VPN isn’t leaking. It’s same with me. When we do speedtest via app, the speedtest app looks for connections details (mobile data or wifi). And in the speedtest(ookla) database they have records of all the tower locations and every tower has an unique id. So, when we do the speedtest with the app (not from website), the app detects user is using mobile data or wifi, if former is true, then based on the signal strength to the tower from that device, the app searches in the database about the tower info (belongs to which telecom operator) which the user is connected, then it shows the name of the operator.

This is a very interesting way of tracking users.

Even if you haven’t enabled GPS, or mobile data or internet and your are using degoogled phone like GrapheneOS, if you have sim card there, you will still be tracked because the app (non open sourced apps) we use, as most(if not all) of them has this functionality built in, to detect users location based on signal strength to the tower.

So, stick with open sourced apps, and web apps if you can. And install the closed source apps on a different user profile and then turned that profile off when not in use.