Chronicle: Away with the paws, bluetooth headset

This chronicle is prompted by the following incident. I’m sitting on the commuter train when suddenly a question pops up on the screen asking if I want to connect my JBL headset. It is true that I have previously tested a JBL headset of that model, but I am far from it now. I look around and a few rows away I see a girl with what looks like that model of JBL headset in her ears tapping on her cell phone looking frustrated. Apparently her headset would rather connect to my phone than to hers.

Google Fast Pair handles this function on Android. If you have previously connected a headset, your Google account remembers it and if your headset appears near another device where you are logged in with your Google account, you will be asked if you want to connect. The function is thus linked to a certain Google account and a certain headset. I don’t have this particular JBL headset, but the probability that the girl on the commuter train is sitting with the exact copy I previously had is very low. It’s also not the first time it’s happened this summer, and far from just with JBL, I’ve had questions from Marshall headsets and Bose speakers on the go.

That Bluetooth is not very secure is nothing new. I’ve had neighbors play music on my speakers by mistake and when I do a quick scan right now I can connect to an LG speaker even though I don’t have one. At the same time, there isn’t that much damage that can happen, you can’t exactly hack someone else’s Wi-Fi via Bluetooth, and playing music on someone else’s speakers is more of a prank than a real problem.

The situation I describe above may not be a serious problem either, but it is different, and it points to a bigger problem with Bluetooth. In the case of the LG speaker, I am actively choosing to play on someone else’s headset. In the example from the commuter train, on the other hand, it is the JBL headset that seeks me out and throws up a dialogue box on the screen when I am doing something completely different than trying to connect to Bluetooth.

This is partly a problem with Google Fast Pair that I complained about before, and partly it’s a problem specific to me having had dozens of headsets connected to dozens of mobiles. But I’m more interested in why this might happen at all.

The keywords are “my headset”. The JBL headset on the commuter train isn’t mine and never was, so why did my mobile think it was mine?

The simple answer to that question must be that Google Fast Pair does not keep track of unique Bluetooth IDs, but simply goes by the name of the gadget. As the vast majority do not give their gadgets unique names, the factory name applies, and it is usually the same for all gadgets of the same model.

Google Fast Pair therefore does not distinguish between different headsets of the same model, and once I have connected a JBL headset of a certain model to my Google account, a box will pop up on my mobile as soon as someone with the same model of headset is nearby.

This is almost unimaginably primitive in my eyes, and it makes a feature that was already annoying more than helpful even more annoying. Above all, I wish that everyone involved in the future will be better at distinguishing between my headset and yours. It can’t be that hard.