A new report published by the Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto suggests that, due to the technology used by our smartphones, we are traceable by hackers, regardless of where we are in the world. Specifically, this study blames the data roaming technology used by our mobile phones for this.
To be even more precise, the authors of this study argue that the underlying technology of mobile data roaming has so many vulnerabilities that it’s impossible for some hackers, even other types of malicious actors, not to consider exploiting them to determine our location at any given moment and thus track us. It’s worth mentioning that these flaws can be exploited by both independent hackers or those belonging to an organized group, as well as certain security services and the like.
Our location and data are barely safe
“Foreign intelligence and security services, as well as private intelligence companies, often attempt to obtain information about location, just like national state actors, such as law enforcement,” as stated in the mentioned report, which you can read in detail in the link above. “In particular, the methods available to law enforcement and intelligence services are similar to those used by illegal actors and allow them to obtain geolocation information of individuals with a high degree of secrecy.”
Going into details, this recent study aimed to indicate that the vulnerability they had highlighted came from IP Exchange (IPX), which is a network that helps telecommunications companies exchange data about their customers. It appears that more than 750 mobile networks use it in around 200 countries worldwide, so the amount of data is not small, to say the least. They also point out that companies can sell, and even resell, access to IPX without any issues, which implies that the number of users is even larger.
Obviously, as you can imagine, all of this goes completely unnoticed by the end users. In fact, the study is not limited to theory, and they have been able to gather several examples of how the mentioned network has been abused in various parts of the world. However, the researchers have not wanted to point very specifically to direct culprits, as no specific company or country is mentioned.
To be more precise, this study blames the entire telecommunications industry for it, as it seems that they do not have very appropriate security standards to prevent these flaws. Legislators are also criticized for not imposing significant legal or regulatory consequences on those who exploit these security vulnerabilities in our mobile devices, which make us more vulnerable to those who do not hesitate to take advantage of them.
