The Electronic Frontier Foundation has concluded that a cell phone surveillance system may have been used by someone during the Democratic National Convention last summer. New report According to Wired, evidence for this assertion comes from Cooper Quintin, a senior technologist at EFF, who spent time investigating whether police technology was used during the event from the event. Wired worked with EFF to conduct the analysis. wireless signal information What they found was evidence that someone might be using a mobile site simulator to spy on devices.
Mobile site simulators are a controversial police tool that can capture wireless signals from the air and store them for later analysis. Mobile site simulators generally perform intermediary Pattern Attack Convince mobile devices are cell towers and should transmit signals to them. These attacks can reveal sensitive personal information, such as location information. Call metadata and app usage volume This is an important channel for entering mobile activities. Popular cell site simulators are stingray
Late reporter Went to the DNC Last summer and a used phone with special software installed. The software was created by EFF and is designed to pick up on data anomalies associated with the device. Wired describes their experiment as follows:
WIRED attended protests across the city, events at the United Center (where the DNC took place), and social gatherings with lobbyists. Important political figures and influential people We spent time walking along march routes and through planned protest sites before, during and after these events.
In this process We recorded Bluetooth, Wi-Fi and cell phone signals. We then analyze those signals, looking for unique hardware identifiers and other suspicious signals. That may indicate the existence of a mobile site simulator.
After analyzing data from those devices, Quinton told Wired that it appeared to show that someone was installing a cell site simulator in the area at the time of the meeting. Wired wrote that one of the devices carried by a reporter “Immediately switch to a new tower.” That tower “requests the device's IMSI (International Mobile Subscriber Identity) and then immediately disconnects.” This is a sequence consistent with how the mobile site simulator works.”
“This is extremely suspicious behavior that normal towers don't exhibit,” Quintin told Wired about the analysis. “This is not 100 percent indisputable fact, but it is clear evidence that cell site simulators were used.” We don't know who is responsible. It could be the US government. foreign actors or other agencies”
Gizmodo reached out to EFF for more information.
It is not yet known what might have motivated people to use the surveillance system at the Democratic National Convention. Although there is one obvious reason why the police wanted to monitor local phone calls at the time. The meeting was ruined by ongoing protests Regarding the Biden administration's support for Israel's attack on Gaza. The protest is over. 40,000 Palestinians Most were reported to have been killed. It's a woman and a child.According to one United Nations estimate Thousands of protesters Gathering outside the DNC in Chicago, in some cases protesters were arrested for breaching barricades outside the convention center.