The Pentagon has admitted for the first time that commercially available location data is being used to target or monitor soldiers in an operational area. In response to a query from Senator Ron Wyden, the Middle East, East Africa and Central Asia branch said it had received several related threat reports. The United States Central Command (CENTCOM) is responsible, among other things, for the troops that carry out the attacks against Iran. It is not clear from the answer what the threat was or which troops were affected. Wyden and other MPs criticize that the US Department of Defense is neglecting the protection of troops.
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Wyden asked, among other things, whether troop members in the operational area had been prohibited from using personal smartphones. If that is not the case, the senator asked for information about any measures that would prevent location data from these devices from being collected and sold. In the April 14 response, CENTCOM states that there is no such ban and that the recommendation to turn off location data collection is not sufficient. The soldiers should therefore implement further security measures. This is primarily about data that is collected for online advertising.
Problem known for years
Wyden fears enemies could use location data to determine the whereabouts and movement patterns of US troops and carry out targeted attacks with missiles, drones or bombs. The fact that adversary states continue to be able to acquire such data from crisis areas “is a direct result of the failure of Defense Department leadership to prioritize this threat.” Recommended cybersecurity measures would need to be implemented. At the same time, the Democratic senator criticizes the fact that the US Department of Defense has known about the threat for at least ten years. Instead of treating it with the necessary urgency, the Pentagon itself bought such data and used it to support the industry.
The politician also refers to research by Bayerischer Rundfunk, netzpolitik.org and Wired, which had already discussed in 2024 that location data for sale online enables movement profiles around military facilities throughout Germany. The data could be used to reconstruct the places of residence and work routes of people with access to a barracks. Wyden demands that the underlying data collection on US military devices must be deactivated. At the same time, web browsers from companies whose business is based on collecting such data would have to be removed. This primarily applies to Chrome from Google. The group assured Reuters that it has “industry-leading security measures” and is committed to stricter regulations.
The data protection issue associated with smartphone advertising IDs has been discussed repeatedly for years, but practices have not changed. This is actually intended to bring together the profiles of different apps on one device in order to be able to personalize advertising. Even if the ID is only linked to the devices and not to people, it can be used for surveillance, which has been done for a long time. Anyone who can use it to track the movement of a smartphone over days, weeks, months or even years can de-anonymize the user. So-called data brokers sell such data; their customers include the federal government, for example.
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