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Mobile phone industry explores worldwide tracking of users

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The mobile phone industry has explored the creation of a global data-sharing system that could track individuals around the world, as part of an effort to curb the spread of Covid-19.

The Guardian has learned that a senior official at GSMA, an international standard-setting body for the mobile phone industry, held discussions with at least one company that is capable of tracking individuals globally through their mobile devices, and discussed the possible creation of a global data-sharing system.

Any move to create such a global tracking system would represent a major escalation in efforts to use mobile phone location data to help stem the pandemic, and would be likely to raise concerns among privacy and security experts.

Until now the use of mobile phone tracking in the fight against Covid-19 has been restricted to national governments, which are either monitoring data within their borders or in discussions with mobile operators and technology companies about doing so.

They include the US, India, Iran, Poland, Singapore, Israel and South Korea. The British government is engaged in talks with BT, the owner of the UK mobile operator EE, about using phone location and usage data to determine the efficacy of isolation orders.

The concept of an international mobile tracing scheme would go further, enabling authorities to monitor movements and potentially track the spread of the disease across borders. The GSMA represents the interests of 750 mobile phone operators and vendors across the world and helps set international standards for companies.

A person familiar with its exploratory talks said they were at an early stage and that decisions had not yet been made about whether to move ahead with the plan. The aim of such a global network would be to enact “contact tracing”, enabling authorities to use mobile location data to track who a person infected with Covid-19 may have come in contact with.

A spokesperson for GSMA strenuously denied it was currently involved in any project to create a global tracking system. “We are not involved in a project of this nature,” the GSMA spokesperson said. However the GSMA also said it would not comment on discussions that had taken place or ideas that were being explored.

“In this emergency situation, the GSMA and its members are doing everything they can to help the global fight against Covid-19,” Mats Granryd, the director of the GSMA, said in a statement emailed to the Guardian. “We are engaging with operators, policymakers and international organisations around the world to explore viable mobile big data and AI solutions to fight this pandemic while adhering to principles of privacy and ethics.”

Advocates of using mobile phone technology in medical emergencies say accurate and up-to-date information can be a vital tool.

The Washington Post reported last week that the US government was in active talks with Facebook, Google and other tech companies and health experts about how location data from Americans’ phones could be used to fight the pandemic. The report suggested public health experts were interested in anonymous aggregate data that could help map the spread of the virus.

The emergency measures approved by the Israeli government last week go further, enabling authorities to track individual people suspected or confirmed to have been infected to notify individuals who may have come into contact with them. They also allow phones to be used to enforce strict quarantine rules.

The proposed UK scheme would involve anonymised mobile phone data being used to monitor whether coronavirus limitation measures such as asking the public to stay at home are working. It could also be used to send health alerts. While the information provided on geographical movement would be delayed by 12 to 24 hours, British privacy campaigners have raised concerns over the scheme, calling for “radical transparency” in the way the government uses mobile data.


One telecommunications expert, who spoke to the Guardian on the condition of anonymity, said GSMA would be capable of creating a global data-sharing network if mobile operators around the world agreed to share usage information. That data would then be used to help authorities visualise the spread of the disease, or to track individual subscribers to perform “contact tracing”, using an individual’s location to detect how the disease might spread.

David Kaye, a UN special rapporteur on freedom of expression, said it was not necessarily a bad thing for governments to use technology as a means to help control the virus. But he said there were important rule of law standards that had to be taken into account if emergency measures were put in place, including the possible tracking of individuals by mobile phone companies.

He said these included alerting individuals whose data was being tracked, being fully transparent about the data collection and subjecting any such initiatives to judicial oversight. He also said there should be sunset provisions in place and continuously reviewed so that emergency measures did not become permanent.

“When I think about how these tools can be helpful, making sure they are adhering to basic standards is really important,” Kaye said.
 
South Africa will be tracking cellphones to fight the Covid-19 virus


  • South African cellphone companies have agreed to give the government location data to help in the fight against the coronavirus behind Covid-19, communications minister Stella Ndabeni-Abrahams said.
  • The information will, it seems, be used to determine at least how many people an infected individual had been in contact with.
  • Several other countries are using different forms of cellphone surveillance during the epidemic.
  • For more stories go to the Business Insider South Africa homepage.
South African cellphone companies have agreed to give the government cellphone location data in order to help fight against the coronavirus behind Covid-19, communications minister Stella Ndabeni-Abrahams said on Wednesday.

"It is important to look at the individuals that are affected [by the virus] in order to be able to help the department of health to say that we know, in a particular area we have so many people that have been infected," she said.

"The industry collectively has agreed to provide data analytics services in order to help government achieve this."


She did not provide further details, and regulations that will govern South Africa's national lockdown, and methods of curbing the spread of the virus, have not yet been published.


Under South Africa's national state of disaster, the government has broad powers to do what it considers necessary to save lives.


Many countries have used location data from mobile phones in their own efforts to combat Covid-19.

South Korea created a publicly-accessible map allowing people to see where they may have crossed paths with individuals carrying the SARS-CoV-2 virus. Israel authorised its spy agency to tap into the cellphones of novel coronavirus carriers to track their movements. Taiwan used an "electronic fence" system to watch that quarantined people stayed at home, based on mobile phone data.

On the other end of the spectrum, Germany and other countries planned to use anonymised location data, which does not track individuals, to model the movement of people, and so model the distribution of the virus.
 
Saudi Arabia may be spying on its citizens via US mobile networks


Data shared by a whistleblower suggests Saudi Arabia may be using a weakness in mobile telecom networks to track its citizens in the US, The Guardian reports. The data shows that over a four-month period, Saudi Arabia's three biggest mobile phone companies sent 2.3 million requests for Provider Subscriber Information (PSI). Normally, that data is used to help foreign operators register roaming charges, but the high volume of requests could also give the Saudi telecoms enough info to track users within hundreds of meters of accuracy.

This takes advantage of long-standing vulnerabilities in a global messaging system called SS7, which routes mobile calls when a user from one country is traveling in another. According to the data shared with The Guardian, the Saudi telecoms sent millions of these PSI SS7 requests to US carriers, including AT&T, T-Mobile and Verizon (Engadget's parent company) between November 2019 and March 1st -- sometimes requesting data as often as two to 13 times per hour.

It isn't clear if the Saudi telecoms were spying on behalf of the government, but the kingdom doesn't have the best track record. Earlier this year, The Guardian reported that Amazon's Jeff Bezos's phone was hacked via a WhatsApp message from the personal account of Prince Mohammed. Twitter has banned thousands of accounts linked with a state-backed effort to promote the Saudi government's message, and the Department of Justice has charged former Twitter employees with spying for Saudi Arabia.

"I think they are surveilling not only those they know are dissidents, but those they fear may deviate from the Saudi leadership," Andrew Miller, a Middle East expert and former member of Barack Obama's national security council, told The Guardian. "They are particularly worried about what Saudi nationals will do when they are in western countries."

Ron Wyden, a Democratic senator from Oregon, previously warned the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) that "malicious attackers" were exploiting SS7 vulnerabilities.
 
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