New internal study
Porn, dating and buying a yacht: what Pentagon employees do on their work cell phones
Of course, smartphones are also used in the US military
© Artur Widak / Picture Alliance
The US Department of Defense is one of the most valuable spy targets in the world. And accordingly well protected – one would think. A recent internal report now shows that when the baser instincts take over, even the toughest rules offer no protection.
Information on possible strategies, attack targets and defense scenarios: Access to the Pentagon’s secret data would be a gold mine for any opponent of the USA and its allies. But in the smartphone era, it’s becoming increasingly difficult to stop them. The employees of the US Department of Defense are just too careless for that.
That shows a just released internal investigation of the Pentagon. She should find out what the employees do with their work cell phones. And found plenty of opportunities for curious third parties to access secret data from the devices.
One gap after the next in Pentagon official cell phones
Because although strict rules apply to service smartphones, they seem to be simply ignored by numerous officials. Huge amounts of apps were found that are actually banned, the report writes. The employees not only installed gaming and dating apps on their work devices. But also highly questionable programs such as those for buying cryptocurrencies, third-party VPN programs and even several apps from China that are explicitly banned.
Although the names of the programs are blacked out, some of them are very clear about which ones. Behind an app from a “Chinese manufacturer for consumer drones” is DJI, the largest manufacturer in this market. The manufacturer’s apps and devices are explicitly banned for US authorities because of its close ties to the Chinese government.
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An app “for the distribution of short videos” should not be difficult to guess. The fact that Pentagon employees install Tiktok is not only a problem there because of the “inappropriate content”. The extremely data-hungry app sniffs out the devices on which it is installed like hardly any other. And was therefore already blacklisted for all US authorities in 2020. The Biden administration is currently considering a complete ban.
End of Mind
Many of the other installed apps are actually not meant for work smartphones either, not to mention those with secret materials. The Pentagon found online role-playing games, unauthorized messengers, but also an app for buying luxury yachts.
Even if most of the apps are not specifically suspected of spying, their use is not without risk. Because many of the apps routinely request access to data such as contacts, location or stored documents, there is always a risk of actually revealing secret information. In the USA it is also extremely common to sell the data collected in this way to third parties.
Using unauthorized VPN services is also a real problem. These services aim to disguise the origin of internet users by redirecting them through a “tunnel”. While this is a desirable effect with trustworthy services, it becomes a danger with dubious ones. Because all traffic is routed through the provider’s servers, it can theoretically record all unencrypted data. There is no need to explain why this is a problem with military data.
However, the report does not explain exactly why employees have so much control over their work devices. It is possible for companies and authorities to restrict the devices accordingly and only allow pre-approved apps and websites. But instead, so far, people have apparently relied on the common sense of the employees. That may have changed by now.
Those: Pentagon report