Do you have the Quran and prayer app called Muslim Pro downloaded on your phone? If yes, then chances are that your location is being tracked by the US military.
This is due to the fact that the US military has been found to be buying private information of users from several apps across the globe. The list of apps includes many that are extensively used by Muslims in the world with some also downloaded around 100 billion times, according to the Play Store data.
The incident was brought to light after an online magazine Motherboard carried out an investigation and published its report on Monday. The report showed the US Special Operations Command purchasing users’ location data from many firms selling it.
The one which gained the spotlight being the most popular one in the list was Muslim Pro, a Muslim prayer and Quran app that allows people to read Quran online with translation, sends reminders for prayer timings, and much more. The app had over 98 million downloads worldwide. The list also had a popular Muslim dating app.
After interviewing developers, carrying out technical analysis and going through public records, Motherboard’s probe found that companies, while paying to advertise their choice of good/product on their app to be enlisted in users’ browsing sessions, also take the app’s location data.
Shockingly, the US military confirmed the published report’s news.
Speaking about the same, Navy Commander Tim Hawkins said, “Our access to the software is used to support Special Operations Forces mission requirements overseas. We strictly adhere to established procedures and policies for protecting the privacy, civil liberties, constitutional and legal rights of American citizens.”
X-mode, is one of the firms that sells data to the US military. The company said that it tracks 25 million devices within the borders of the US every single month of the year and 40 million devices outside of the United States, in different parts of the world like Latin America, Asia-Pacific area, European Union and others.
To check the report, Motherboard downloaded Muslim Mingle, the dating app on an Android powered mobile phone. The app immediately sent the location data, with the exact geolocation coordinated as well as the WiFi network name to X-mode, confirming the transfer of data to X-mode by the apps.
Motherboard’s investigation also found similar work being done by other apps like a step-counter named Accupedo, the weather app Global Storms, and CPlus for Craigslist.
US Senator Ron Wyden told the probing company that X-Mode also accepted that its sells location data it collects through apps to other “US military customers”.
X-mode, however, denied it.
“X-Mode licenses its data panel to a small number of technology companies that may work with government military services, but our work with such contractors is international and primarily focused on three use cases: counter-terrorism, cyber-security and predicting future COVID-19 hotspots,” X-Mode told the online magazine
