US forces in war zones have been targeted using commercially available location data, US Central Command (Centcom) confirmed in a letter.
Centcom said it had received multiple threat reports concerning adversary exploitation of commercial location data to target or surveil US personnel “in theatre,” according to the April 14 letter. Senator Ron Wyden, an Oregon Democrat, shared the letter with Reuters. However, the message gave no further specifics.
Centcom’s area of responsibility includes the Gulf, where US forces are confronting the Iranian military over the Strait of Hormuz.
A bipartisan group of lawmakers described the disclosure as the first official confirmation of such targeting in a letter sent to the Pentagon on Thursday. The letter warned that commercial location data can reveal where troops gather and their patterns of movement. Moreover, adversaries could exploit this data for missile, drone or roadside-bomb attacks and for counterintelligence. Wyden said in a statement that it was time to treat the adtech industry as a national security threat.
The Pentagon did not respond to requests for comment. Also, the lawmakers said their attempts to obtain more details from military officials had been unsuccessful.
Location data is collected from smartphones and apps, then sold to data brokers who resell it, often through chains of intermediaries. The national security risk has drawn growing attention.
In 2016, a US defence contractor used commercial location data to track special operations forces to a staging post in Syria, the Wall Street Journal first reported. Furthermore, journalists at Wired and two German outlets later used broker data to map activity around 11 US military and intelligence sites in Germany.
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Alphabet’s Google said Chrome had “industry-leading security” and that it had long advocated for stronger safeguards against data brokers.
