Surveillance of Americans’ smartphones has been no secret for a few years. In 2020, an article from Wall Street Journal revealed that various government institutions under the Trump administration had purchased access to the smartphone location data of millions of US citizens to track undocumented immigrants and suspected tax evaders.
If the facts had been confirmed, a new figure has just put them in perspective. Documents obtained and published on July 18 by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) reveal that these surveillances were carried out on “a much larger scale than estimated so far,” indicates the specialized media TechCrunch.
336,000 location points
Two institutions in particular are involved: Immigration and Customs Enforcement and US Customs and Border Protection, both of which are part of the US Department of Homeland Security.
The 6,000 files obtained by the ACLU contain more than 336,000 location points, obtained through the phones of US residents. The customs and border protection service even identified, in 2018, in just three days, 113,654 location points located in the southwest of the country, which represents more than 26 locations per minute.
The company that provides this data to the US government is called Venntel. It is a “data broker”, a data broker that collects and resells this data retrieved from mobile applications, be it video games, weather tools or online stores.
According to TechCrunch, by acquiring this data from brokers, the authorities circumvent the regulations inherent in these practices. The Aclu specifies that these actions “go against the Fourth Amendment”, being “unreasonable governmental searches and seizures through the purchase and use of immense volumes of data silently extracted from people’s phones”.
A vague “consent”
In the documents, the government justifies these actions by stating that all data is anonymous.
Just as all this data is collected “with the consent” of users, who “voluntarily” share these elements.
However, even though most companies indicate that they collect personal data, such as location data, the terms are often not very accessible and difficult for most users to interpret. In most cases, users agree to these terms of use which include data sharing by default.
As a result, most users are simply unaware that their data is being used in this way.
Source: BFM TV
Emily Miller is a voice to be reckoned with in the world of opinion journalism. As a writer for News Rebeat, she brings a unique and thought-provoking perspective to current events and political issues, delivering insightful and engaging commentary.