Flat design may be less distracting to you but that also means it's less clear, because there are fewer obvious demarcation.
I despise flat design, it's downright awful design, and done for looks rather than functionality.
Even saying it's "less distractive" supports this.
Microsoft also did this to obfuscate features, which is pretty apparent when you consider new users used to "discover" features via the menu system. I supported Office for MS in the early days, and this was a huge thing at the time. It was discussed heavily when training on new versions.
You don't need a stingray to simply pickup cell broadcast which has the ID in it. Technically your phone is doing this, as the tower you connect to has an ID.
As you mentioned, cell ID is there too. Pretty easy to simply capture IMSI data (don't even have to do anything, phones are alway broadcasting their ID).
Combine IMSI, BT, MAC, date/time, and boy you've got one helluva surveillance device.
Add in BT headphones, watches, etc, and you have even more data points to associate.
I wouldn't be shopping there just because of that.
Circling back around, I do feel like not all hope is currently lost.
My own contradiction: I feel pretty cynical about it, and yet I'm working on my own solutions for my family and friends. Part of me thinks it's pointless, but I refuse to give in completely.
I already try to use better comms, minimize the data my phone shares (setting up a de-googled pixel now), and have always avoided most social media (never been on FB/Twitter, etc, as in never even gone to the websites).
I dunno, all my younger family and their friends are neck deep in the shit, and aren't interested in hearing my "conspiracy theories"...despite them being front page news every day (all the ransomware, hacks, etc).
Since people won't (for example) switch to privacy-respecting comm apps just because I ask them too, I'm building my own self-hosted box that I can duplicate for my family and friends.
My goal is to provide them with a single box solution for DNS filtering (PiHole), media server (including auto disc conversion and sharing between boxes), local backup (which will replicate encrypted backups to the other boxes similar to what Crashplan Personal did), phone backup and management (MDM and file management from PC), image and file sharing (something like Facebook for family only), instant messaging (most likely XMPP), etc, etc.
Yes, it's a pretty bold plan, but my family and friends are tech illiterate, so if I want to see an improvement in privacy for myself and them, it's on me to do it, and make it attractive for them.
Because what you wrote is unnecessarily convoluted, circular and overly complex.
Going right along with that is your sophist projection of someone "complaining". Nowhere was there a complaint. That was nothing more than an argumentation tactic by you: sophistry.
It was actually a success story. It failed safe, as designed.
Unfortunately "The China Syndrome" really pumped up anti-nuclesr sentiment.
TMI was the opposite of Chernobyl.