flight aware work around?

[GeorgePerry]

Interested if anyone knows a simple (inexpensive) way to avoid flight aware IFR tracking?  I understand you can opt out for a fee on the flight aware site, but I don't like the idea of spending money for privacy. 

Most often I don't mind the flight aware "big brother" watching, but there are times I'd rather not beem my movements out to the world...any ideas

[hansel]

Even if you pay the annual fee to opt out of Flight Aware tracking, I'm not certain your flights would removed from every database.

I believe the FAA has a program with the National Business Aviation Association (NBAA) to prevent dissemination of flight data at the source. The original intent was to prevent company flights from being tracked by the public and its competitors. You'll need to submit a Block Aircraft Registration Request (BARR) to the NBAA, see: http://www.nbaa.org/ops/security/barr/

although I'm not exactly sure what criteria is used to qualify (e.g., the request needs to be made on company letterhead, but I couldn't find any other guidance). Maybe having your bird registered in an LLC will help.

I'm also interested in what other members have to say about this.

[Buster1]

Interesting.  Some of my friends birds and one I am watching that's for sale haven't shown up on Flight Aware for 6+ months.  The seller tells me it flies regularly...but it's most recent Flight Aware sortie was 6+ months ago.  I thought it had something to do with IFR flightplans, or VFR flight following. 

[FlyDave]

I think you're flights would still be listed on other sites such as Flightwise (http://flightwise.com/tracking/) if you request not to be listed on FlightAware. If I was concerned about my flights being available to the world I'd check into this before paying FlightAware.

[randypugh]

I took mine off and it can be done for free. I challenge anyone to find it anywhere. I havn't been able to find it so I think it worked.

[John Pleisse]

George,

Looks like it won't even matter. NBAA's primary revenue stream is this service. Everybody is gonna KEEP watching us !! Not much we can do, except not file and mabe repaint your tail number every year....and not fly, I guess.

http://www.avweb.com/blogs/insider/AVwebInsider_BARRBack_204792-1.html

 

 

[tony]

well Randy are you gonna keep it a secret or tell us how to do it? 

[Piloto]

Quote: Buster1

Interesting.  Some of my friends birds and one I am watching that's for sale haven't shown up on Flight Aware for 6+ months.  The seller tells me it flies regularly...but it's most recent Flight Aware sortie was 6+ months ago.  I thought it had something to do with IFR flightplans, or VFR flight following. 

[knute]

Flight following used to show up, but doesn't anymore.  According to some posts on one of the forums at FlightAware, it has something to do with how the FAA changed the tagging in the data stream.  I used to enjoy looking up my past flights that were done with flight following to verify ground speeds, to see what they thought my altitude was (compared to what I thought it was), etc.  It's not clear at this point according to what I know from FlightAware if this is going to be fixed anytime soon, and it has nothing to do with whether a transponder code was issued on the ground or in the air for a VFR flight following flight- if all the data blocks are not input by the controller (which they aren't for a VFR flight) it doesn't show up.

[74657]

I find that if I contact the nearest towered airport for flight following it will not show up.  If I contact Chicago or the nearest center approach frequency I will show up.  So far I know it works that way on Chicago, Minneapolis and Cleveland approach

[knute]

Interesting!  You're having a lot better luck out in Chicago than we're having in Oakland Center.  I've picked up flight following from coordination from San Carlos ground (Class D), from NorCal directly, from Oakland Center, and from Salt Lake Center, dand none of those stuck enough to show up on flight aware.  Of about 20 flight following flights over the last 12 months in California, Nevada, Oregon, Idaho and Utah, none have shown up; not one.

What I'm most curious about is that if your flight following flight is showing up at all, there is a discrepancy with the information the FlightAware folks provided to explain why they aren't (for the most part) able to provide any tracking information for VFR flight following flights.  I'll do some more digging over at FlightAware, and if I find out anything new to add, I'll post it here.

[The-sky-captain]

It hasnt picked up any VFR flight following for me in the past several months either and I always get it on the ground with the tower. IFR shows up everytime.

[GeorgePerry]

Quote: randypugh

I took mine off and it can be done for free. I challenge anyone to find it anywhere. I havn't been able to find it so I think it worked.