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Defense employees are no longer allowed to use sports and fitness apps on their service phones and the private devices that they take with them. In many cases, the personal data of the defense personnel seem to be related to the applications, so that they can be found on the Internet
This is what the Minister of Defense, Ank Bijleveld, informed the House of Representatives. Research by the research group De Correspondent and Bellingcat recently revealed all kinds of personal information from defense personnel via the Polar fitness app. In total, the researchers were able to detect more than two hundred sensitive sites, with 6,460 individuals from 69 different nationalities.
View sporting activities on the map
This information can be derived from a map that Polar publishes online. This map shows the sporting activities of Polar users. By studying this map, it is possible to check, for example, which users were involved in a military base in northern Iraq. By subsequently collecting more information about these users, it is possible to know where they are in the Netherlands. Using this information, De Correspondent not only found the exact address of a soldier, but also found names and pictures of his family members.
"We prohibit applications for defense devices used by the military, but also private devices that cause them to work," said Minister Bijleveld against Nieuwsuur. If the soldiers install the apps anyway, they are punishable. "We do not know exactly what sanctions will be, we have to look at that."
Other applications also disclose information
Polar is not the only application that does not guarantee the privacy of users. The researchers have also managed to retrieve user information via Endomondo, Runkeeper and Strava, although it is more difficult with these applications than with Polar.
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