Report: Spies use smartphone apps to track people

Published January 28, 2014 12:36am ET



LONDON (AP) — Documents leaked by former NSA contactor Edward Snowden suggest that spy agencies have a powerful ally in Angry Birds and a host of other apps installed on smartphones across the globe.

The documents, published Monday by The New York Times, the Guardian, and ProPublica, suggest that the mapping, gaming, and social networking apps which are a common feature of the world’s estimated 1 billion smartphones can feed America’s National Security Agency and Britain’s GCHQ with huge amounts of personal data, including location information and details such as political affiliation or sexual orientation.

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