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posted by Fnord666 on Tuesday August 18 2020, @03:02PM   Printer-friendly
from the good-luck-with-that dept.

Secret Service bought location data pulled from common apps:

The Secret Service paid a private company for access to location data generated by common smartphone apps, Motherboard reports. Internal documents obtained through a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request show that the agency spent $35,844 for a one-year subscription to Babel Street's product Locate X, which tracks the location of devices via data harvested from popular apps.

As Motherboard notes, the glaring issue with this contract is that it allows the law enforcement agency to buy information that it would normally need a warrant or a court order to obtain.

[...] In March, Protocol reported that US Customs and Border Protection purchased Locate X, and a former Babel Street employee told Protocol that the Secret Service and US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) were using the location-tracking tech. But Motherboard has the first confirmation that the Secret Service did in fact purchase Locate X.

[...] Senator Ron Wyden is reportedly planning legislation to block law enforcement from purchasing products like Locate X.

"It is clear that multiple federal agencies have turned to purchasing Americans' data to buy their way around Americans' Fourth Amendment Rights. I'm drafting legislation to close this loophole, and ensure the Fourth Amendment isn't for sale," Wyden said in a statement provided to Motherboard.


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  • (Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday August 19 2020, @02:48AM (1 child)

    by Phoenix666 (552) on Wednesday August 19 2020, @02:48AM (#1038674) Journal

    There are already citizens using databases to doxx people they don't like. Its incidence is rather limited at the moment, but there is no reason it should remain so. The US is a country with less than 1 billion people; it's not that hard to reduce that data set to an identifiable number quickly.

    Even those who work for the CIA/NSA/FBI etc are not immune to the de-masking power of modern computation devices. If the citizens of the US get mad enough, they too will be found and dealt with.

    The information revolution is a double-edged sword, and its secrets are not relegated to the government or corporations alone.

    --
    Washington DC delenda est.
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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 19 2020, @05:57AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 19 2020, @05:57AM (#1038740)

    Sure would suck to have the corporations and the government as your enemy tho. I sure don't feel like I'm the enemy, but I guess I need to stop dreaming and get my head down and suck corp./govt. dick some more.