US troops can still be tracked by purchased location data, and Congress wants to know why
DoD controls on mobile ad identifiers haven't stopped military location data turning up for sale..
DoD controls on mobile ad identifiers haven't stopped military location data turning up for sale.
The short version
- US Senator Ron Wyden (D-OR) and Rep.
- Pat Harrigan (R-NC) on Friday asked for an investigation by the Defense Department Inspector General into policies that have only partially stanched the flow of location data that allows military personnel to be tracked and targeted.
- They noted that the DoD has been aware of this threat since at least 2016.
What happened
The lawmakers urged Defense Department CIO Kirsten A. Davies to take steps to mitigate this risk, including turning off advertising identifiers on DoD smartphones and issuing a policy requiring the disabling of advertising identifiers on all personal devices brought into DoD facilities or overseas.
Why it matters
Since then, various military branches have blocked advertising identifiers on government-issued devices.
Summary by Nerd News Network. Read the full article at The Register — Networks via the links above and below.