A CBC/Radio-Canada investigation has found cell phone trackers at work near Parliament Hill and embassies

April 3, 2017 By administrator

ESD America’s CryptoPhone – purchased by CBC and Radio-Canada – can detect when an IMSI catcher is trying to intercept it. (CBC )

By Catherine Cullen, Brigitte Bureau, CBC News

A months-long CBC News/Radio-Canada investigation has revealed that someone is using devices that track and spy on cellphones in the area around Parliament Hill.

The devices are known as IMSI catchers and have been used by Canadian police and security authorities, foreign intelligence and even organized crime.

The devices, sometimes known by the brand name of one model, StingRay, work by mimicking a cellphone tower to interact with nearby phones and read the unique ID associated with the phone — the International Mobile Subscriber Identity, or IMSI.

That number can then be used to track the phone and by extension the phone’s user. In some instances, IMSI catchers can even be used to gain access to a phone’s text messages and listen in on calls.

At the heart of Canadian government

To do the investigation, our journalists used a device that detects IMSI catchers created by the German company GSMK. While it looks like a regular cellphone, the CryptoPhone emits an alert when a fake cellphone antenna intercepts its signal.

Media in the United States, Norway and Australia have done similar tests, but this is the first time it’s been used by a media outlet in Canada.

During tests in December and January, the CryptoPhone set off alerts at locations around Parliament Hill, including the nearby Byward Market, the Rideau Centre shopping mall and CBC offices in downtown Ottawa.

Because IMSI catchers have a radius of about half a kilometre in an urban setting, the IMSI catchers CBC detected could reach territory including Parliament Hill, the Prime Minister’s Office in Langevin Block, National Defence headquarters, as well as the U.S. and Israeli embassies.

We then used even more sophisticated equipment called an Overwatch Sensor that confirmed the presence of an IMSI catcher close to Parliament Hill.

Who is behind it?

We wanted to know more about who might be using the IMSI catcher or catchers that we detected, so we asked the U.S. supplier of the CryptoPhone to analyze the alerts we were getting.

ESD America specializes in counterintelligence and its clients include U.S. Homeland Security.

“Consistently you’ve been seeing IMSI catcher activity, definitely,” said CEO and co-founder Les Goldsmith, when we took our results to the company’s Las Vegas office.

Read More: http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/imsi-cellphones-spying-ottawa-1.4050049?cid=

3 Turkish men arrested in Germany over spying charges

December 19, 2014 By administrator

German prosecutors said Thursday, Dec 18 that they had arrested three Turkish men accused of spying on compatriots in Germany for Turkish intelligence, but Ankara denied that the suspects were linked to the National Intelligence Organization (MİT), Hurriyet Daily News reported.

The federal prosecutor’s office said two of the suspects – identified in line with German privacy rules only as Muhammed Taha G. and Göksel G. – were arrested Wednesday at Frankfurt airport. The third, Ahmet Duran Y., was arrested at his home in western Germany.

Muhammed Taha G. is accused of handling the other two as agents, and they collected information for him on Turks in Germany as well as their “organizational structures,” prosecutors said in a statement.

They did not elaborate or say when the alleged spying took place, but said arrest warrants were issued on Nov 11.

The suspects were ordered to be remanded in custody pending a possible indictment.

Turkish security officials, who spoke to daily Hürriyet on condition of anonymity, said the three suspects had no links to MİT or the Prime Ministry. The same sources stressed that arrests came soon after media outlets affiliated to the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) alleged that the Turkish Cooperation and Development Agency (TİKA) was being used by MİT to recruit agents in Germany. They also noted that Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan had recently slammed the European Union regarding a Dec 14 police operation on the Gülen community in Turkey, according to the HDN.

Germany is home to a large Turkish community.

In August, Turkey summoned Germany’s ambassador and demanded an explanation over a German magazine report that Germany’s foreign intelligence agency listed Turkey, a NATO ally, as a target for intelligence gathering.

German officials refused to confirm the report, the HDN says

Press TV correspondent accused of spying over unbiased reporting (Video)

October 18, 2014 By administrator

Presstv The Turkish intelligence agency has accused the Press TV correspondent in Turkey of spying probably due to her coverage of Ankara’s stance on ISIL atrocities in the Syrian Kurdish town of Kobani and the recent protests in Turkey.

As heavy clashes rage on in and around Kobani, the Ankara government is preventing some journalists from reporting the developments on the ground in the border region.

Press TV correspondent Serena Shim said on Friday that Ankara has accused her of spying probably due to some of the stories she has covered about Turkey’s stance on the ISIL terrorists in Kobani and its surroundings.

Shim said she was among the few journalists obtaining stories of militants infiltrating into Syria through the Turkish border, adding that she had received images from militants crossing the Turkish border into Syria in World Food Organization and other NGOs’ trucks.

“I think it’s definitely because of the reporting about Syria,” Shim said, pointing to her reports about “the so-called Free Syrian Army going in [Syria] and catching these Takfiri militants and getting their passport stamps and getting first-hand information that they were actually inside while Turkey was still hiding this.”

The Turkish government alleges that “I am spying and that I am working with the Turkish opposition but it’s only logical that I would speak with the Turkish opposition just the same way I would speak with other parties … because that’s my job,” she added.

She flatly rejected accusations against her, saying she was “surprised” at this accusation “because I have nothing to hide and I have never done anything aside my job.”

Kobani and its surroundings have been under attack since mid-September, with the ISIL militants capturing dozens of nearby Kurdish villages.

Turkey has been accused of backing ISIL militants in Syria.