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Stories filed under: "military"

Appliance, Tractor, And Irrigation Companies Lobby Against Military ‘Right To Repair’ Reforms

from the fix-your-own-shit dept

Despite the best efforts of automakers and companies like Apple, states continue to push forward with popular “right to repair” reforms that make it easier and more affordable for consumers to repair tech they own.

While they vary in potency, New York, Oregon, California, Massachusetts, Colorado, Maine, and Minnesota have all now passed some flavor of right to repair laws. Colorado just got done passing its third such bill. The first two ensured that consumers had access to the parts, tools, and documentation they needed to repair agricultural equipment and powered wheelchairs.

The push has even started to expand into the military, and some appliance and tractor manufacturers aren’t happy about it. The fine folks at 404 Media obtained documents showcasing how both industries are lobbying hard against new legislation that could make it easier for the U.S. military to fix the equipment they buy.

As usual, baseless fearmongering is the name of the game, with both industries claiming that more affordable and easier repair would somehow hurt small companies, and might even pose security risks:

The letter argues that the legislation “would undermine the principle underpinning existing technical data rights statutes, which are designed to balance the government’s technical data needs against contractors’ need to protect sensitive proprietary and trade secret information.”

The claim that easier and more affordable repair poses some kind of unacceptable privacy and security risk is always the first one made by companies looking to lock down their lucrative repair monopolies. Apple for years falsely claimed such reforms would create a dangerous surge in nefarious hackers. Automakers claim such reforms will be a boon to sexual predators.

A 2021 bipartisan FTC report showcased how these claims are routinely false. In reality, right to repair reforms not only help make repair more affordable (a boon to military-funding taxpayers) but drive greater availability of manuals, parts, and tools, making tech safer.

In this case the lobbying and policy organizations trying to scuttle military right to repair reforms range from the “Institute of Makers of Explosives” and Aerospace Industries Association to the Irrigation Association, all of which are clearly getting nervous about the potential for even broader federal reforms.

Filed Under: appliances, hardware, legislation, military, reform, right to repair, tractors

Data Broker That Trafficked In Abortion Clinic Location Data Also Helps The Air Force With ‘Targeting’

from the conflict-of-interest-much? dept

Fri, Feb 23rd 2024 05:23am - Karl Bode

There are two major reasons that the U.S. doesn’t pass an internet-era privacy law or regulate data brokers despite a parade of dangerous scandals. One, lobbied by a vast web of interconnected industries with unlimited budgets, Congress is too corrupt to do its job. Two, the U.S. government is disincentivized to do anything because it exploits this privacy dysfunction to dodge warrants and expand surveillance.

Case in point: a data broker by the name of SafeGraph was busted in 2022 selling the app-gleaned location data of users who had visited abortion clinics. Journalists found that the company was selling a week of granular location data of clinic visitors for as little as $160, documenting not just which clinic they visited and how long they stayed, but where they went before and after.

There have been multiple examples of data brokers trafficking in such data without doing much to even confirm the identities of purchasers. That’s obviously a problem post-Roe, given this data can be abused to harass or send targeted misinformation to vulnerable women, or exploited by state AGs in authoritarian-drifting states to prosecute women seeking health care (and those who help them).

At the same time, SafeGraph contracts with government agencies like the CDC to help do things like track the effectiveness of pandemic lockdowns. And there’s ongoing, emerging data indicating that the company has a fairly robust relationship with the U.S. Air Force that involves providing data for, among other things, “targeting cycle and decisions” in “contested geographies.”:

“Geospatial Data to Navigate Contested Geographies,” the documents and public procurement records, dated May 2023, read. “Improving AFCENT and 9AF Targeting Cycle and Decisions.” 9AF, or Ninth Air Force, is responsible for missions with partner nations in Southwest Asia.”

As with most companies and industries, this rampant over-collection and monetization of data (with very little in the way of meaningful safeguards) is justified by the claim the data is “anonymized.”

In reality, studies show that anonymization means nothing, and it’s trivial to identify individual users given how many different available datasets are now available in the wild. Our refusal to even modestly regulate these markets creates a treasure trove of surveillance opportunity not just for corporate America, but for global intelligence agencies.

So on one hand, you have a massive, unaccountable data broker industry that’s routinely found to be abusing privacy at unprecedented scale, resulting in no limit of abuse by stalkers, hackers, extremists, law enforcement, and global intelligence agencies. On the other hand, you have a U.S. government that’s disincentivized to do anything about that problem because it benefits from the broad dysfunction.

Much like telecoms like AT&T, once data brokers are tightly interwoven with surveillance, military, and other government functions they effectively become immune from meaningful regulation or oversight at any scale. The only thing that’s going to break that chain of dysfunction is a privacy scandal the likes of which we haven’t seen yet; one that likely either involves fatalities or a massive privacy violation of a large group of people with meaningful wealth or power.

Only then will Congress have the adequate political motivation to lay down some basic guidelines on the rampant over-collection and monetization of location and behavior data. But I’m not keen to see what this inevitable apathy backbreaker actually looks like.

Filed Under: corruption, location data, military, privacy, security
Companies: safegraph

from the not-exactly-trustworthy dept

Wed, Aug 2nd 2023 05:24am - Karl Bode

While Elon Musk’s Starlink low Earth orbit (LEO) broadband technology is too expensive and capacity-constrained to seriously put a dent in US broadband problems, it’s helpful in low connectivity situations like disasters, select parts of rural America, or the war in Ukraine. But Musk’s growing power over the fledgling LEO satellite sector has started to worry global military leaders, according to the New York Times.

Especially after an incident last year where Musk restricted Ukraine’s access to the service near Crimea because he personally opposed Ukraine’s military aims:

In Ukraine, some fears have been realized. Mr. Musk has restricted Starlink access multiple times during the war, people familiar with the situation said. At one point, he denied the Ukrainian military’s request to turn on Starlink near Crimea, the Russian-controlled territory, affecting battlefield strategy. Last year, he publicly floated a “peace plan” for the war that seemed aligned with Russian interests.

Musk’s mythology is so outsized, even global military leaders are worried about expressing their concerns that his increasingly-erratic behavior (and ties to countries like China) could impact global connectivity and national security, lest they upset the petulant billionaire:

At least nine countries — including in Europe and the Middle East — have also brought up Starlink with American officials over the past 18 months, with some questioning Mr. Musk’s power over the technology, two U.S. intelligence officials briefed on the discussions said. Few nations will speak publicly about their concerns, for fear of alienating Mr. Musk, said intelligence and cybersecurity officials briefed on the conversations.

In short, imagine the kind of petty, incoherent, counterproductive bumbling that reflects Musk’s management of ex-Twitter, and apply it to a global communications resource increasingly being used for sensitive military endeavors, aid work, and disaster relief.

In some ways the New York Times oversells Starlink’s importance. While slowly growing, the network has unavoidably struggled with speed issues due to the nature of satellite physics. Like Tesla Solar, Starlink customer service is a mess that’s also struggled to scale. There’s that whole undermining scientific research through light pollution thing. It’s also not particularly profitable, relying on the heavy subsidization of Space X to function as a concept.

Personally intervening in military conflicts while spewing right wing tween 4chan memes on a social media platform you’ve made increasingly friendly to CSAM probably isn’t the best strategy to keep this particular gravy train afloat.

Like Tesla Motors, Starlink also has a growing parade of well-funded competitors (like Amazon) looking to enter the space. And all of their lobbyists are surely licking their chops at the idea of using Musk’s erratic behavior and (tendency for self-immolation) as a reason why global organizations and governments should consider switching to less…dramatic communications alternatives.

Filed Under: china, elon musk, leo satellite, military, national security, natsec, russia, starlink, telecom, ukraine war
Companies: spacex, starlink

US Military Continues To Violate The Law By Limiting Access To Court Records

from the neither-the-spirit-nor-the-letter dept

Court transparency and equitable access to court documents are ongoing struggles. The federal court system’s malicious compliance with congressional directives has given us exorbitant fees and a clunky, counterintuitive platform for online access to court documents.

Part of the federal court system doesn’t even give us that much. Despite being subject to a 2016 law mandating access to military court documents, the US military’s court system has continued to do its own thing. For seven years, it pretty much completely ignored the law ordering it to perform “timely” releases of court documents “at all stages of the military justice system.”

This hasn’t happened. A recent Pentagon directive finally addresses the seven-year-old law. But the directive merely tells military branches it’s still business as usual, no matter what the law says. Megan Rose has the details for ProPublica.

Caroline Krass, general counsel for the Defense Department, told officials from the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, Coast Guard and Space Force in a memorandum last month that they could mostly continue doing what they have been for years: keep many court records secret from the public.

[…]

The guidance tells the services they do not have to make any records public until after a trial ends. It gives the military the discretion to suppress key trial information. And in cases where the defendant is found not guilty, the directive appears to be even more sweeping: The military services will be allowed to keep the entire record secret permanently.

ProPublica has long known the military isn’t following the law. It sued the Navy late last year for refusing to hand over court records related to an extremely questionable arson prosecution. The violations will continue, it appears, officially blessed by the DoD’s head legal rep.

The memo [PDF] appears to instruct the military’s court system to act more like the rest of the federal court system.

Public access to military justice docket information, filings, trial-level court documents, and appellate documents should follow the best practices of Federal and State courts, to the extent practicable.

Then the discretionary part kicks in. “To the extent practicable” aren’t words that inspire efforts meant to surmount obstacles. They’re words that encourage lackadaisical efforts — something that doesn’t even rise to the level of trying. It encourages failure due to a lack of effort, so long as actual success can still be portrayed as impracticable.

These aren’t the best practices of federal and state courts, which generally make most documents available almost immediately.

Absent extraordinary circumstances, filings, trial-level court documents, and appellate documents will be publicly accessible no later than 45 calendar days after the certification of the record of trial (at the trial court level) or after the Court of Criminal Appeals decision (at the appellate level).

“Extraordinary circumstances.” Just a little more discretionary leeway. And while the memo notes courts are free to make documents available earlier, they won’t be considered in violation of a directive that is pretty much in direct violation of federal law.

A 45-day delay means most court records will be of limited public interest and of almost no use to journalistic agencies, which rely on the newsworthiness of their reporting to attract readers and viewers. And what will be made public won’t be everything that’s made public by other courts.

The services do not have to provide transcripts or recordings of court sessions or any evidence entered as exhibits, according to the Pentagon guidance. And the Pentagon does not consider any preliminary hearing documents to be part of the trial record.

In the military, there is a proceeding called an Article 32 hearing to decide whether there is enough evidence for a trial. Under the new guidance, the military won’t have to put these hearings on the docket, so the public won’t even know they are happening.

If there’s any upside, it’s this: the guidance does not allow the military to continue to abuse Freedom of Information Act exemptions to redact or withhold court documents. That kind of thing doesn’t fly in the US federal court system and it definitely has no place in the military court system.

The rest is all downside. A law is only as effective as its enforcement. Unless Congress is willing to step in and force the Defense Department to issue new guidance that actually complies with the 2016, the military will continue to play keep away from taxpayers.

Filed Under: access to court documents, discretion, dod, military, transparency

Pentagon Publication: Young People Getting Injured At Basic Training Because Of 'Nintendo Generation'

from the okay-boomer dept

If any take has been evergreen over the past few decades, it’s that video games are the source of all the problems with the youth these days. If you want to take that further, you can boil it down to, “that thing kids enjoy but I didn’t grow up with is the reason why everything is terrible.” You see this all over the place. The New York Times thinks the pandemic made all the kids play all the video games all the time creating all the problems. Established politicians say video games are the reason we have gun violence in America. Even cute little fascists like Josh Hawley, who appears to be what would happen if you took an image of Slender Man and gave him human-like features, says that video games contribute to a loss of manliness in America.

So it may not come as a particular surprise that some in the Pentagon think that youth playing video games creates problems for the military as well. But it should be surprising that anyone in the Pentagon would want to blame the “Nintendo generation” for basic training injuries due to — checks notes — weak skeletons.

The article, titled “Why Today’s ‘Gen Z’ is at Risk for Boot Camp Injuries” interviewed Army Maj. Jon-Marc Thibodeau—a clinical coordinator in charge of medical readiness at Fort Leonard Wood in Missouri.

When asked about the youth of today, Maj. Thibodeau was straightforward. “The ‘Nintendo Generation’ soldier skeleton is not toughened by activity prior to arrival, so some of them break more easily,” he said.

This wild assertion is backed up by anecdotes from a therapist at an army hospital who talks about some of the injuries she sees occurring in basic training. Notably, no fully formed studies run by the Pentagon are cited. Also notable is that many of the injuries are soft-tissue injuries, which have nothing to do with the strength of someone’s skeleton. It’s also notable that this take coming from the military isn’t especially novel: JFK lamented the softness of Americans in 1960, as the Vice article notes.

This all has pure “get off my lawn” vibes. First, the “Nintendo generation” isn’t attending basic training these days, because that was my generation and I’m 40 years old. I’ll also suggest that this may not be the message you want to deliver to a youth group that you’re actively courting to join the military. And, finally, I noticed a complete lack of acknowledgement as to how much of active “fighting” these days utilizes technology and methods of control of that technology that damned sure looks like something closer to playing a video game compared with scaling a manufactured wall. Drones, anyone?

And it’s not as though everyone in the DoD agrees with Thibodeau’s hot take.

Not everyone in the military thinks the younger generation is soft. Retired Navy Admiral William H. McRaven, former head of Special Operations Command, once said that anyone calling Millennials soft had never “seen them in a firefight in Afghanistan.”

Despite Maj. Thibodeau’s problems with the Nintendo Generation, the Pentagon has been actively courting them over the past few years by dropping millions of dollars on schemes to make Navy sailors and Army soldiers into esports stars on Twitch. The Nintendo Generation didn’t care for it much.

Nor will youth that will make up the future fighting forces care for the Pentagon’s messaging here, I don’t think. This stuff is real easy to say, but unless the Pentagon wants to back it up with real data, this is simply the armed forces shooting itself in the foot. I learned not to do stuff like that… by playing video games.

Filed Under: blame, military, video games
Companies: nintendo

Because The Defense Department's Secure Communications Options Don't Work For Everyone, Soldiers Are Turning To Signal And WhatsApp

from the breaking-the-rules-to-stay-in-touch dept

The military has an obvious need for secure communications. It offered its support of encryption even as the NSA tried to find ways to undercut to make its surveillance ends easier to achieve.

The problem is the military doesn’t have a great plan for securing communications between personnel. Due to tech limitations the Defense Department has yet to overcome (despite billions in annual funding), soldiers are turning to third-party messaging services to communicate orders and disseminate information.

The use of the encrypted messaging app Signal is ubiquitous within the Department of Defense. Service members have received briefings about operational security (OPSEC) and information security (INFOSEC) and have taken the dangers of living in a digital world seriously by making sure that the work-related text messages they send on their cell phones are encrypted. The contradiction is that using Signal for official military business is against regulations.

Securing communications apparently means breaking the rules. The DoD forbids the use of non-DoD-controlled messaging services to handle the distribution of nonpublic DoD information. The Defense Department insists personnel use its services, but those services can’t be accessed by employees who don’t have military-issued cell phones. And everyone has a cell phone, so it’s often easier to use third-party platforms to communicate.

When this happens, it raises the risk that unauthorized access or sharing of information could occur. It also puts many communications beyond the reach of public records requests, which often cannot access communications between privately owned devices.

And there appears to be no fix on the immediate horizon. The Defense Department is quick to point out the use of Signal and WhatsApp violates regulations. But it has nothing in place that would allow the many military members not in possession of government-issued cell phones to communicate when out in the field.

This is what the Secretary of Defense’s Public Affairs Officer (Russell Goemaere) told Audacy when asked about how military members were expected to use DoD-approved communications platforms they didn’t actually have access to on their personal devices.

“DoD365 provides a messaging capability that is approved for CUI and use on DoD mobile devices. The Services are in the final stages of testing Bring Your Own Approved Device (BYOAD) and Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) solutions that provide access to the DoD365 collaboration capability on service member’s personal devices,” Goemaere said.

It’s 2022 and the Defense Department is only at the “final stage of testing” for solutions it needed years ago. Cell phone usage has been ubiquitous for nearly two decades at this point. For the Department to still be weeks or months away from a solution should be considered unacceptable. Denying soldiers access to third-party options means cutting them off from communications that can often have life-or-death implications.

This also means the Defense Department is still weeks or months away from ensuring communications subject to FOIA law are being captured and retained. The priority should still be personnel safety, but this is another downside of the Defense Department’s slow roll into the 21st century.

Filed Under: dod, encrypted messaging, encryption, military, soldiers
Companies: meta, signal, whatsapp

Data Broker Looking To Sell Real-Time Vehicle Location Data To Government Agencies, Including The Military

from the come-get-ur-dystopia dept

Location data is the new growth market. Data harvested from apps is sold to data brokers who, in turn, sell this to whoever’s buying. Lately, the buyers have been a number of government agencies, including the CBP, ICE, DEA, Secret Service, IRS, and — a bit more worryingly — the Defense Department.

The mileage varies for purchasers. The location data generally isn’t as accurate as that obtained directly from service providers. On the other hand, putting a couple of middle men between the app data and the purchase of data helps agencies steer clear of Constitutional issues related to the Supreme Court’s Carpenter decision, which introduced a warrant mandate for engaging in proxy tracking of people via cell service providers.

But phones aren’t the only objects that generate a wealth of location data. Cars go almost as many places as phones do, providing data brokers with yet another source of possibly useful location data that government agencies might be interested in obtaining access to. Here’s Joseph Cox of Vice with more details:

A surveillance contractor that has previously sold services to the U.S. military is advertising a product that it says can locate the real-time locations of specific cars in nearly any country on Earth. It says it does this by using data collected and sent by the cars and their components themselves, according to a document obtained by Motherboard.

“Ulysses can provide our clients with the ability to remotely geolocate vehicles in nearly every country except for North Korea and Cuba on a near real time basis,” the document, written by contractor The Ulysses Group, reads. “Currently, we can access over 15 billion vehicle locations around the world every month,” the document adds.

Historical data is cool. But what’s even cooler is real-time tracking of vehicle movements. Of course the DoD would be interested in this. It has a drone strike program that’s thirsty for location data and has relied on even more questionable data in the past to make extrajudicial “death from above” decisions in the past.

Phones are reliable snitches. So are cars — a fact that may come as a surprise to car owners who haven’t been paying attention to tech developments over the past several years. Plenty of data is constantly captured by internal “black boxes,” but tends to only be retained when there’s a collision. But the interconnectedness of cars and people’s phones provides new data-gathering opportunities.

Then there are the car manufacturers themselves, which apparently feel driver data is theirs for the taking and are willing to sell it to third parties who are (also apparently) willing to sell all of this to government agencies.

“Vehicle telematics is data transmitted from the vehicle to the automaker or OEM through embedded communications systems in the car,” the Ulysses document continues. “Among the thousands of other data points, vehicle location data is transmitted on a constant and near real time basis while the vehicle is operating.”

This document wasn’t obtained from FOIA requests. It actually couldn’t be — not if Ulysses isn’t currently selling to government agencies. It was actually obtained by Senator Ron Wyden, who shared it with Vice’s tech-related offshoot, Motherboard. As Wyden noted while handing it over, very little is known about these under-the-radar suppliers of location data and their government customers. This company may have no (acknowledged) government customers at this point, but real-time access to vehicle movement is something plenty of government agencies would be willing to pay for.

And Ulysses has inroads with the military. Cox/Motherboard have worked with US Special Operations Command in the past to help it track financial transactions made by entities in foreign nations in hopes of better understanding how our enemies convert “buying local” into a weapon against US interests.

Unfortunately, the documents don’t explain how Ulysses obtains this data or which car manufacturers/OEM distributors are contributing to the real-time location data pool. But it could be dozens of interoperable parts. Manufacturers gather some data. So does the manufacturer of integrated entertainment systems and Bluetooth-compatible devices, including whoever’s combining forces to provide in-car navigation. Then there are services drivers use, like parking garages, which may collect additional data about vehicles in the area. It all adds up to an easy way to track cars. This data may not be able to say for sure who’s driving, but information gathered from connected devices may make it easier to determine identity. All of this adds up to a big pile of data that could easily be wielded to do things like engage in drone strikes.

Even if it’s not being used to kill people, it can be used to track people. It beats automatic license plate readers which only trigger responses when target vehicles pass cameras. It beats third-party app data because it can be used in real time. And it beats protections we’re supposed to have in place following the Supreme Court’s Carpenter decision. A car may not be a person, but it’s pretty damn close. And data only another data broker away can link cars to people and allow government agencies to make plenty of inferences about their day-to-day activities. This is happening now and it’s all under the radar, for the most part. It’s an unregulated market that wields useful tools against their users, subverting their expectations of privacy and making it easier for governments to engage in off-the-constitutional-books tracking.

Filed Under: 3rd party data, 3rd party doctrine, 4th amendment, data brokers, location info, military, realtime location info

Trump Makes It Official: He's Going To Pull Military Funding, Because Congress Won't Kill The Open Internet

from the really-now dept

There were some questions as to whether or not Trump would actually go through with his threat to veto the National Defense Authorization Act, which has been passed and signed into law every year for the past six decades, but it appears that is the case. The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) has officially notified Congress that Trump is vetoing the NDAA… because they refuse to kill off the open internet.

The letter it sent to Congress is… just completely disconnected from reality.

The Administration recognizes the importance of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) to our national security. Unfortunately, this conference report fails to include critical national security measures, includes provisions that fail to respect our veterans and our military’s history, and contradicts efforts by this Administration to put America first in our national security and foreign policy actions. Therefore, the Administration strongly opposes passage of the conference report to Accompany H.R. 6395.

There are three key complaints he raises in the letter. (1) The NDAA doesn’t completely repeal Section 230 of the Communications Act (which has nothing to do with the military). (2) That it allows for the renaming of bases that were named after the Confederacy and (3) that it limits his ability to scream “national emergency” and use those claims as a reason to steal money from the military to build his stupid wall (as he’s been doing).

The 230 bit is particularly stupid:

Despite bipartisan calls for addressing Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, this bill fails to make any meaningful changes to that provision.

Um, yes, because it’s got literally nothing to do with the military or the purpose of the NDAA. There is no reason to include anything related to 230 in the NDAA and multiple elected officials have explained that to Trump. But he wants to throw one of his temper tantrums instead.

Section 230 facilitates the spread of disinformation online and is a serious threat to our national security and election integrity. It should be repealed.

So he’s finally expressed some rationalization for how 230 impacts national security, but he’s wrong. The 1st Amendment is why disinformation can spread online and taking away 230 won’t change that. And, I should note that one of the biggest vectors of disinformation that is spread online is… the President himself. Especially over the last month. And, I’d argue that the President has also been the biggest threat to election integrity.

It’s Section 230 that has enabled many experts to speak out and show how the nonsense and disinformation that Trump and his cronies are spewing is inaccurate.

As for the claim about renaming bases named after Confederate Army officials, it’s difficult to see how that is failing “to respect our veterans and our military’s history.” Remember, the Confederacy fought against the US military. You’d think it would be more respectful to our veterans not to have them serve from bases named after an army that fought against us. But Trump’s gotta Trump.

Republicans in Congress now have a choice. They’ve been hinting that they’ll override a Trump veto, and now is the time for them to stand up and make it clear that’s exactly what they’ll do.

Filed Under: confederate bases, congress, donald trump, military, military funding, ndaa, omb, section 230, veto

Trump Doubles Down On Threat To Defund Military Because People Are Mean To Him Online; Republicans Threaten To Override His Veto

from the what-a-way-to-end-the-presidency dept

On Tuesday, we highlighted that it looked like Congressional Republicans were willing to finally stand up to their party’s insecure and whiny lame duck president and refuse to include a Section 230 repeal as part of the military authorization bill, the NDAA.

Senator Jim Inhofe, who heads the Senate Armed Services Committee and who lead the negotiation on the bill, has been a longtime supporter of the President, and has said that the two talk by phone every couple days. But on Wednesday, Inhofe apparently did his phone call telling Trump that the 230 repeal wasn’t going into the NDAA while on a speakerphone walking down the hallway of a Senate building, meaning that people overheard Inhofe tell Trump that the 230 repeal wasn’t going to happen.

On Thursday, the negotiations closed and a deal was made on the NDAA that does not include anything on Section 230 because, as Inhofe rightly notes, that’s got nothing to do with the military at all. In response, Trump continued his temper tantrum and claims he really will veto the bill, putting the military he always claims to support so much at risk of severe cuts.


That’s Trump saying that because the NDAA doesn’t revoke Section 230, which Trump falsely says is “so bad for our National Security and Election Integrity” (it’s not), he will veto. The thing is, everyone knows he’s full of shit. And Republicans are not only saying that they have the votes to override a veto, they seem to be getting snippy with the President about it. Here’s Republican Congressman Adam Kinzinger saying he’ll vote to override the veto and concluding with the kind of thing you don’t often hear from Republicans these days when talking to Trump: “Because it’s really not about you.”

No, it’s not about him. But it is about him throwing a total whiny tantrum because people made fun of him online, and wanting to punish the entire internet and free speech in response. The idea that it’s worth undermining the military (which he claims to support, and which frequently supports him) is… quite something.

Filed Under: confederate basis, congress, donald trump, jim inhofe, military, ndaa, republicans, section 230, veto

US Military Is Buying Location Data From Data Brokers, Including Data Pulled From US App Users

from the welcoming-our-new-dystopian-warlords dept

As long as government agencies are buying location data from data brokers — possibly eluding warrant requirements while doing so — it makes sense the US military would be doing the same thing. Joseph Cox reports for Motherboard that the American war machine loves location data pulled from phone apps just as much as CBP, ICE, and the Secret Service do.

Through public records, interviews with developers, and technical analysis, Motherboard uncovered two separate, parallel data streams that the U.S. military uses, or has used, to obtain location data. One relies on a company called Babel Street, which creates a product called Locate X. U.S. Special Operations Command (USSOCOM), a branch of the military tasked with counterterrorism, counterinsurgency, and special reconnaissance, bought access to Locate X to assist on overseas special forces operations. The other stream is through a company called X-Mode, which obtains location data directly from apps, then sells that data to contractors, and by extension, the military.

The apps creating the data the military is obtaining include some expected sources (given our nation’s constant targeting of some very particular demographics) like the Muslim Pro prayer app and dating app Muslim Mingle. But there are some more unexpected sources, like a Craigslist search app and, weirdly, an app that acts as a level for installing things like shelves and cupboards.

The Muslim Pro app has been downloaded over 98 million times, providing quite the data stash for military intelligence analysts. And, lest we forget, data like this is instrumental in our extrajudicial killing programs. Making this even more horrifying is the fact that some app developers were unaware their software was providing data to the US military. Most spoken to by Motherboard were unfamiliar with the numerous customers lining up to buy the information they’re carelessly demanding from users — customers that likely include government agencies located elsewhere in the world who are not quite as restrained in their investigations, renditions, or killings.

While the data brokers spoken to for this article claim the data is anonymized, current and former employees also made it clear “anonymization” of data being utilized this way is a joke.

USSOCOM bought access to Locate X, a location data product from a company called Babel Street, according to procurement records uncovered by Motherboard. A former Babel Street employee described to Motherboard how users of the product can draw a shape on a map, see all devices Babel Street has data on in that location, and then follow a specific device around to see where else it has been.

The Locate X data itself is anonymized, but the source said “we could absolutely deanonymize a person.” Babel Street employees would “play with it, to be honest,” the former employee added.

Part of the draw is the budget pricing. Millions of data points can be accessed on the cheap. USSOCOM’s licensing package runs less than 100,000,whichisprettymuch100,000, which is pretty much 100,000,whichisprettymuchFREE in terms of US military spending. The military’s spokesperson says the military never uses this cheap access to target US citizens… at least not in the United States. Presumably US targets who wander out of the country are considered fair game.

And it’s not absolutely clear the US military doesn’t have access to domestic location data. Senator Ron Wyden — who has been on top of this since the news broke earlier this year — said lawyers for data broker X-Mode Social (which the military has contracts with) has sold data collected from phones in the US to defense contractors and other military customers. The company has refused to identify which contractors and military customers are purchasing data they have no business obtaining.

But it’s not simple to suss out who’s selling who what data. Everything is intertwined and hidden behind layers and layers of data broker middlemen. Even if apps are letting users know the app will collect their location data, they aren’t telling users this data may end up in the hands of government agencies and military contractors. In most cases, it appears developers are unaware of this fact. In some cases, the middlemen brokers aren’t completely in the loop. It’s impossible for users to make an informed decision about data-sharing, but most likely assume the data collection will only target them with ads, not drone strikes.

Filed Under: apps, data brokers, location data, military, privacy