'Horrifying' leak reveals ICE 'stalkers' have access to Americans' cell phone data

[reACTIONary]

67. The way this is done without a warrant is.....

.... to purchase the data from data aggregators that collect the data legally and are in the business of selling it. So, yes, private citizens, who can afford it, can track you in this way.

"ICE had purchased two products produced by the American software company Pen-Link"

Pen-Link is a software company composed of "private individuals", and I don't think Pen-Link would have any quams about selling their products to anyone with the money.

Here I an example of the cell phone "tracking" product, which does not track in real time, but instead provides historical data:

Webloc is a controversial cellphone location-tracking system used by law enforcement agencies, notably U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and the Texas Department of Public Safety. Developed by the Israeli company Cobwebs (which merged into PenLink in 2023), it aggregates vast amounts of commercial location data from hundreds of millions of mobile devices.

How Webloc Works

Webloc operates by purchasing location data that is generated by smartphone apps for advertising purposes. This data includes information from apps, GPS, and Wi-Fi signals and is linked to a mobile advertising ID (MAID). The system's key features include:

Mass Data Collection: It gathers an extensive database of location points from a multitude of apps without requiring direct access to a user's phone.

Geofencing: Users (e.g., law enforcement agents) can draw a virtual perimeter on a map and query the system for all devices present in that area during a specific time.

Movement Tracking: It monitors and traces the historical movements of individual phones over time to establish patterns, infer home addresses, workplaces, and social connections.