Popular fitness and geolocation apps may be spilling the beans on American’s top-secret military bases abroad. Over the weekend, news broke that an app, “Strava”, may have inadvertently been revealing the locations of top-secret military bases operated by the United States, Russia, and other global powers. What might otherwise be a “bloopers” moment is raising a lot of eyebrows because soldiers and military operations may have been put at risk.
Strava publishes a “Global Heat Map”. The heat map shows jogging and other physical activity by the company’s subscribers. If you look at the map, many fully-developed countries and major cities are the brightest. The United States, European Union, Japan, Australia and interestingly Brazil and Malaysia all shine quite bright.
However, you may notice some other, harder to explain glowing parts of the map. Parts of far-flung and less-developed countries have been glowing, and in many cases appear to correspond with military bases. In Afghanistan, Syria, and elsewhere, the only people likely to own such fitnesses devices are foreign soldiers.
The potential security leak was first made public by Nathan Ruser, a 20-year-old Australian student. Ruser’s father actually commented on Nathan’s blog, arguing that the Global Heat Map was really a map that showed where “rich white people are.” Seeing the wisdom of the off-hand comment, Ruser wondered if that would also hold true for soldiers. Ruser Tweeted his theory and early findings, and it subsequently blew up.
A Daily Beast reporter found evidence on a beach near Mogadishu, Somalia. The area examined was near a suspected CIA base. A journalist at the New Yorker, meanwhile, dug up potential U.S. Special Operation bases across the Sahel Region in Africa. A Twitter user also claimed to have found an American Patriot missile system in Yemen.
Internet sleuths also examined publicly known bases, such as the Kandahar air base in Afghanistan. Unsurprisingly, the Global Heat Map shows the base in surprising detail. This supports the theory that soldiers are indeed using and accidentally leaking information through Strava’s service.
Checking out the map myself, I did indeed find some rather conspicuous glowing areas in Southwest Asia and across the Middle East. Vast seas of darkness punctured by tiny but intensely bright dots. These bright dots may have been caused by soldiers going for a jog and otherwise staying in shape. Hopefully, by the time you read this article, the potentially vulnerable spots will have been removed.
Strava claims to have 27 million users across the world. Their tracking services are frequently used with Fitbit and Jawbone fitness devices. Many people wear such devices all day so that they can track how many steps they take. The app can also be used with other devices, such as smartphones.
Fitbits and other exercise devices have generally been encouraged by the military. In fact, back in 2013, the American military gave away 2,500 devices in a pilot program targeting obesity. However, if a soldier goes on patrol while wearing a Fitbit connected to Strava, they will inadvertently leak their entire patrol route to the Internet.
Further, concentrations of light could indicate where soldiers are congregating, such as mess halls. This could make it easier for terrorists and other attackers to pinpoint the most vulnerable areas on a given military base. Patrol routes, supply routes, and other valuable bits of information could also be revealed.
