[HN Gopher] Surveillance data challenges what we thought we knew...
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Surveillance data challenges what we thought we knew about location
tracking
Author : _tk_
Score : 193 points
Date : 2025-10-14 20:36 UTC (2 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.lighthousereports.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.lighthousereports.com)
| aucisson_masque wrote:
| I didn't quite understand how they are capable of tracking people
| and breaking WhatsApp encryption.
|
| There is mention of fake antenna but I don't think they cover
| entire country with that, how do they do?
| jonplackett wrote:
| Yes - and they also claim not to track users themselves. Is
| that just a lie or is there someone else doing the tracking?
|
| This article answers none of my questions!
| kipchak wrote:
| There's more details in the technical explainer linked in the
| article.
|
| https://www.lighthousereports.com/methodology/surveillance-s.
| ..
| CGMthrowaway wrote:
| They use vulns in the outdated SS7 system to trick networks
| into revealing a numbers location (1), and intercept SMS
| including the verification codes sent by apps like WhatsApp -
| allowing them to hijack accounts and monitor messages and calls
| directly (2). This method works remotely and doesn't require
| antennas
|
| The SMS are intercepted because thru SS7 by tricking the
| network into thinking the target phone is roaming (3).
|
| (1)https://www.lighthousereports.com/methodology/surveillance-s
| ...
|
| (2)https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2025/10/firstwap-
| altami...
|
| (3)https://www.fyno.io/blog/is-it-easy-to-intercept-sms-a-
| compl...
| arkadiyt wrote:
| > intercept SMS including the verification codes sent by apps
| like WhatsApp
|
| For anyone worried, this approach:
|
| 1) Breaks the existing phone from receiving WhatsApp
| messages, so you can notice that behavior
|
| 2) Can be prevented by setting up a WhatsApp pin in your
| settings
| citizenpaul wrote:
| Not just vulns. It is possible to simply purchase access or
| become a provider in the SS7 system (<$20-50k USD). SMS is
| basically a completely open system at this point.
| Cybersecurity companies do it all the time for pentesting. So
| do "Cybersecurity companies".
|
| Horrifying that nearly banks still require you to use sms as
| a 2fa and do not offer any other alternative.
|
| Did you really think the US Gov was OK with facebook running
| the biggest "encrypted" SMS system on earth. LOL of course
| they already had access to all the messages.
| varenc wrote:
| Hijacking WhatsApp SMS authentication codes can be
| prevented by just adding a PIN to your account. Doing this
| attack also doesn't grant you access to someone's old
| WhatsApp messages, and contacts with "security notices"
| enabled will see that your device has changed. It's quite
| different than big gov just having access to all your
| WhatsApp messages. (But there might be other ways they can
| do this, but just SMS sniffing doesn't get you there)
| bayindirh wrote:
| > Horrifying that nearly banks still require you to use sms
| as a 2fa and do not offer any other alternative.
|
| In my country banking applications are tied to your phone
| via IMEI, SIM and other hardware dependent information
| available.
|
| Forget getting banking details and use another device
| without the user knowing, either.
|
| If someone clones your SIM or gets a replacement in behalf
| of you, your all banking access is blocked until you enable
| them one by one with your ID card or other means.
|
| One of the banks can use FaceID as a secondary factor, too.
|
| So, other methods are possible. It's an "implementation
| detail" at this point.
| simultsop wrote:
| And then they call people paranoid to go off the grid.
| dylan604 wrote:
| That's what they do to the people that figure things out. They
| discredit them so other people will not listen to them. It's
| the ones that go full tilt with lining the walls of their
| houses to be Faraday cages that make it all fringy cringy the
| rationally paranoid folks get lumped in with.
| physarum_salad wrote:
| Well its always funny to observe politicians/other VIPs use
| similar technologies to the most "loopy" prepper when they
| need to. Like actual faraday/signal jamming tents during
| negotiations or similar.
| lawlessone wrote:
| tbf, when the UK introduced a text to notify people of
| missing children ,some people(including relatives) were
| complaining on facebook that it could be used by the UK
| government to track everyone.
|
| As if their government couldn't just track the smartphone or
| them via social media already.
| baxtr wrote:
| For anyone interested, they also have a technical explainer that
| describes their methodology in detail.
|
| https://www.lighthousereports.com/methodology/surveillance-s...
| janwillemb wrote:
| It is about a company, First Wap, that makes it possible to track
| individuals. Their USP is a piece of software that operates at
| phone network level and uses the fact that phone companies still
| support an old protocol, Signalling System 7:
|
| > Phone networks need to know where users are in order to route
| text messages and phone calls. Operators exchange signalling
| messages to request, and respond with, user location information.
| The existence of these signalling messages is not in itself a
| vulnerability. The issue is rather that networks process
| commands, such as location requests, from other networks, without
| being able to verify who is actually sending them and for what
| purpose.
|
| > These signalling messages are never seen on a user's phone.
| They are sent and received by "Global Titles" (GTs), phone
| numbers that represent nodes in a network but are not assigned to
| subscribers.
| beached_whale wrote:
| I assumed it was the telecoms just selling the data about their
| subscribers. https://www.telecomstechnews.com/news/fcc-fines-
| major-telcos...
| Tenemo wrote:
| > We found Netflix producer Adam Ciralsky, Blackwater founder
| Erik Prince, Nobel Peace Prize nominee Benny Wenda, Austropop
| star Wolfgang Ambros, Tel Aviv district prosecutor Liat Ben Ari
| and Ali Nur Yasin, a senior editor at our Indonesian partner
| Tempo.
|
| Political figures being there I somewhat understand, but a
| Netflix producer? Why would anyone need to track a Netflix
| producer?
| kipchak wrote:
| Maybe hoping to bump into them for a impromptu elevator pitch
| for a show?
| gnatman wrote:
| Looking at his career and production credits, it's probably
| more accurate to describe him as a journalist who's covered
| some sensitive subjects.
| layer8 wrote:
| He's also a journalist and had a carrier at the CIA. Why don't
| you look him up if you're curious about that?
| kjs3 wrote:
| They're a critic?
| attila-lendvai wrote:
| look up Operation Mockingbird. half of the media is government
| operatives...
|
| netflix is a crucial tool of narrative control...
|
| they are nowhere near "just producers"...
| trinsic2 wrote:
| This is why I think Microsoft, Apple and Google are owned as
| well. And answers a lot of questions about gatekeeping and
| vendor lock-in
| nostrademons wrote:
| It's fascinating how these secrets are turning up in the press
| now. The article is (probably intentionally) vague about it's
| sources: they only say "Lighthouse found a vast archive of data
| on the deep web". But reading between the lines - does that imply
| that this surveillance company kept records on thousands of
| targets, and then _left them in an open S3 bucket_? Not the first
| time - the TM_Signal leak of upper-echelon U.S. government
| communications was also facilitated by an open S3 bucket that
| contained the message archives of everything that, say, the
| Secretary of Defense was messaging to the POTUS.
|
| But it is highly ironic that these companies specialize in
| surveillance, tracking, and security, and then have a tendency to
| leave the data that they steal from others open to the Internet
| in a very amateurish security lapse that in turn leads to
| everyone stealing from them.
| dylan604 wrote:
| Is it possible the phreakers are so specialized they have no
| experience with cloud admin and just went with some copypasta
| from SO answers to get the boring shit done so they could get
| back to phreaking? Not everyone is an expert in cloud
| management. It is easy to bork something when you have no idea
| what you're doing because you don't want to be doing it. They
| could have also hired low level people to do something for them
| and just didn't spend enough to have it done correctly. There's
| many reasons for a very specialized group of smart people to do
| something utterly dumb and easy to avoid by people with other
| specialized skills. These people would probably look at you as
| silly and amateur for using SMS.
| walterbell wrote:
| _" Why the US still won't require SS7 fixes that could secure
| your phone"_ (2019)
| https://arstechnica.com/features/2019/04/fully-compromised-c...
| the group: - dragged its feet on resolving SS7
| security vulnerabilities - repeatedly ignored input from
| DHS technical experts - [identified] best practices..
| using different filtering systems - [but] pushed.. to
| rely on voluntary compliance
| daxfohl wrote:
| Did I miss something? This was not surprising. I figured all this
| would have been possible (and commonplace) decades ago. I was
| expecting this to be about government eyes and ears in my toilet
| or something.
| Lapsa wrote:
| mind reading technology is here, an actual reality
| lschueller wrote:
| Another brilliant example, why we need good (cooperating,
| international) journalism
| DyslexicAtheist wrote:
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| https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.secomtrax....
|
| ---
|
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|
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|
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|
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| malwrar wrote:
| I wish journalists would explore why the technical methods &
| information sharing that enable this surveillance are allowed to
| exist. Highlighting instances of abuse and the quasi-legal nature
| of the industry doesn't really get at the interesting part, which
| is _what motivates our leaders to allow surveillance in the first
| place_.
|
| I recently completed Barack Obama's _A Promised Land_ (a partial
| account of his presidency), and he mentions in his book that
| although he wanted to reform mass surveillance, it looked a
| little different once he was actually responsible for people's
| safety. I often think about this when I drive past Flock cameras
| or walk into grocery stores; our leaders seem more enticed by the
| power of this technology than they are afraid of vague abuses
| happening in _not here_. It seems like no one sees a cost to just
| not addressing the issue.
|
| By analogy, I feel that reporting on the dangers of fire isn't
| really as effective as reporting on why we don't have arson laws
| and fire alarms and social norms that make our society more
| robust to abuse of a useful capability. People who like cooked
| food aren't going to engage with anti-fire positions if they just
| talk about people occasionally burning each other alive. We need
| to know more about what can be done to protect the average person
| from downsides of fire, as well as who is responsible for
| regulating fire and what their agenda for addressing it is. I'd
| love to see an article identifying who is responsible for
| installing these Flock cameras in my area, why they did so, and
| how we can achieve the positive outcomes desired from them (e.g.
| find car thieves) without the negatives (profiling, stalking,
| tracking non-criminals, etc).
| kklisura wrote:
| > This investigation began with an archive of data. [...] It
| contains 1.5 million records, more than 14,000 unique phone
| numbers, and people surveilled in over 160 countries.
|
| Why not HIBP (Have I Been Pwned) style site to check against the
| database if your number is in?
| Flockster wrote:
| I could not compare it completely, but it sounds very much like
| this talk that I saw many years ago at the CCC.
|
| SS7: Locate. Track. Manipulate. [2014]
| https://media.ccc.de/v/31c3_-_6249_-_en_-_saal_1_-_201412271...
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