The latest from the Edward Snowden files is enough to horrify millions worldwide: The government is watching your mobile gaming. Angry Birds and other “leaky apps that spew everything from users’ smartphone identification codes to where they have been that day” have been a special focus for American and British intelligence agencies hoping to gather as much potentially useful info as possible. “Golden Nugget!” screams one “top secret” leaked slide. “What can we get?”
“Smartphones almost seem to make things too easy,” the New York Times reports:
… the agencies have traded recipes for grabbing location and planning data when a target uses Google Maps, and for vacuuming up address books, buddy lists, phone logs and the geographic data embedded in photos when someone sends a post to the mobile versions of Facebook, Flickr, LinkedIn, Twitter and other services. […]
Some personal data, developed in profiles by advertising companies, could be particularly sensitive: A secret 2012 British intelligence document says that spies can scrub smartphone apps that contain details like a user’s “political alignment” and sexual orientation.
If not on Grindr, Tinder, or Candy Crush, where are we truly free?
