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Iran may have targeted soldiers with bought data
The Pentagon's answer
Wyden's office asked the Pentagon straight up whether there were any reports that Iranians had targeted American soldiers. The answer was yes, and the Pentagon gave little detail beyond the fact that it had received the reporting. CENTCOM seems to believe it is at least credible that the data was used to target Americans.
Who can buy it
The data is out there for sale, and adversaries can buy it. China, Russia, and Iran could obtain the same data without difficulty, and there have been reports of other foreign governments getting it, particularly through Israeli companies.
Tracking and recruiting
A soldier who has been careless and left a phone unlocked down can expose where a unit is going. A government can also use the data to recruit people: it can learn where a worker at a General Motors factory goes after work and send an intelligence officer there to persuade the worker to hand over critical information.
How did a fitness app reveal military bases?
In late 2017 the fitness app Strava published a global heat map of its users' activity. In January 2018 analysts noticed that it outlined the shapes of military bases in places such as Syria and Afghanistan, because personnel jogged the same routes with their trackers on. The Pentagon followed in August 2018 with a memo restricting the use of geolocation features in operational areas.
Why buy data rather than hack for it?
Buying commercially available data requires no break-in, so there are no intrusion alerts for a defender to catch. The sale is legal in most places, and a buyer can work through intermediaries or shell firms to hide who it is. A report from an Office of the Director of National Intelligence advisory panel, declassified in 2023, described commercially available information as increasingly consequential for intelligence work and as a source that can reveal sensitive personal details.
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