An analysis of monitoring apps installed on people鈥檚 smartphones in the US as an alternative to incarceration found numerous privacy flaws. For instance, an app used to track a quarter of a million people with pending immigration cases required 鈥渄angerous permissions鈥� without mentioning it in its privacy policy.
at the University of Washington in Seattle and his colleagues analysed 16 Android smartphone apps used by federal and state authorities to track people awaiting immigration court dates, young people in juvenile detention systems and adults on parole or probation.
Seven of the electronic monitoring apps appeared to violate the Google Play Store鈥檚 user data policies by either linking to generic privacy policies or failing to link to any privacy policy at all.
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Among them was BI SmartLINK, used by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to track undocumented immigrants who have been released from detention and are awaiting court dates to determine if they will be allowed to stay in the country. The number of people monitored through the app has grown from fewer than 6000 in September 2019 to almost 248,000 as of last month, according to statistics from ICE鈥檚 programme.
ICE requires users to check in daily or weekly on the app by taking a selfie that is processed through face-recognition technology. Like many electronic monitoring apps, SmartLINK requests what are considered 鈥溾�� in the Android OS, such as accessing the camera, getting the device鈥檚 precise location, making phone calls without the user鈥檚 permission and recording audio. But that information was originally missing in the generic privacy policy linked to in SmartLINK鈥檚 Google Play Store page from October 2021 through March 2022, says Owens.
The app鈥檚 developer, BI Incorporated, changed the link and updated the after being contacted by Owens and his colleagues. 鈥淚n 2021, BI launched a new bi.com website and the link was erroneously directed to the privacy policy for bi.com,鈥� says Monica Hook, a spokesperson for BI Incorporated.
Six apps, including SmartLINK, also communicated with unique internet domain names that could enable employers and school administrators with Wi-Fi network monitoring tools to figure out if any users of such apps are connected to the network. 鈥淏I complies with all applicable privacy requirements and is always working to improve our products and services,鈥� says Hook.
Two other apps connected to Facebook analytics and login services. This means that if someone logs into the app using their Facebook credentials, Facebook could learn that the person is using an electronic monitoring app. One of these apps, called Sprokit, was considered 鈥減otentially the most invasive鈥� of the surveyed apps and has been offered to at least 1000 鈥渘on-violent, low-level offenders鈥� as an alternative to incarceration in places such as Los Angeles, San Francisco and Oakland, California; Atlanta, Georgia; Iowa and New York.
Sprokit even contained code that would allow Google and Facebook to display ads. 鈥淎dvertisers may be profiting off people鈥檚 coerced use of apps,鈥� says Owens. Sprokit did not respond to New 杏吧原创鈥檚 request for comment.
The team also found Google Play Store reviews complaining of buggy apps that drained phone batteries faster or even caused phones to crash.
SmartLINK users reported difficulties in completing their required check-ins with ICE. That puts people at greater risk of being re-detained, which statistically means a much higher risk of losing their immigration court case, says at Just Futures Law, a nonprofit organisation based in Washington DC. BI Incorporated鈥檚 , says that 88.4 per cent of SmartLINK check-ins were completed successfully over the past five years.
Electronic monitoring apps are making it easier and cheaper for government authorities to perform mass surveillance of immigrants and other vulnerable populations, says at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a nonprofit digital rights group. The technology cost of monitoring a SmartLINK user is less than $1 a day, compared with $2.74 a day for an ankle monitor, according to ICE statistics.
鈥淲e鈥檙e seeing more and more people who normally wouldn鈥檛 be subjected to immigration detention or an ankle monitor now being subjected to surveillance as a result of how cheap and easy it is to install these apps on people鈥檚 phones,鈥� says Hussain.
Owens and his colleagues presented the at the USENIX Security Symposium held in Boston, Massachusetts, in August.
