Federal authorities have issued a mobile security alert to Americans using US cellular networks. The alert states that cell phone using populace in America is being tracked and all their calls, texts and data streams are being spied by some Nefarious Actors.
The same privacy risk to Americans was acknowledged by the federal authorities in a written letter to the Department of Homeland Security and Oregon Senator Ron Wyden. The letter states that some state-funded actors are exploiting a flaw in the global cellular networks to target the communications of American citizens as they roam the country and the world.
The Washington Post published the latest on this issue describing the act as a surveillance system that taps into a global messaging system that allows mobile phone customers to move from one network to other.
According to the sources reporting to Cybersecurity Insiders, Signaling System 7(SS7) or Common Channel Signaling System 7, a series of protocols were built in 1975 to help connect phone carriers around the world.
In the year 2016, it was discovered by security analysts that a flaw in the SS7 can allow hackers to track user location, dodge encryption, an even record private conversations. As most of the cell phone carriers failed to acknowledge or at least talk about the flaw, the vulnerability remains the same and has in fact doubled in recent times.
On May 27th, 2018, the Federal Communications Commission’s (FCC) Chairman Ajit Pai received an update about the danger from Wyden. In fact, the senator stressed on the fact that the SS7 vulnerability was already being exploited and it could have spilled sensitive data to the dark web.
Details related to which US Carrier/s was involved and how many US citizens have been compromised has been currently withheld by the DHS.
That’s due to the fact that the Fed feels that leaking details to the media without the completion of the investigation will be a puerile move.
