US Army to soldiers: 'Check-ins' can kill

MSNBC ^ | 3/15/2012 | Athima Chansanchai

[U-238]

While the U.S. Army knows its soldiers live in the modern world and carry location-aware, socially networked smartphones, it is reiterating the dangers of broadcasting too much information, because oversharing could cost lives.

"Someone with the right software and the wrong motivation could download the photo and extract the coordinates from the metadata."

As civilians, we're constantly giving out warnings about the dangers of revealing real-time locations via Facebook and Foursquare check-ins, or via tweets. We also tell you how to disable location tracking in your smartphones. Not only does it make individuals vulnerable to stalking, but also to robbery and other theft, if someone knows when you're not home. But that still doesn't deter many people, who still feel the need to tell us which restaurant they're at, whose house they're visiting and any other venue that they may feel to be of interest.

But soldiers who upload photos to Facebook "could broadcast the exact location of their unit," wrote Rodewig, citing Steve Warren, an administrative officer in the intelligence office of the Army's Maneuver Center of Excellence (MCoE). Warren gave Rodewig a chilling example of the consequences of geo-tagging from 2007:

"When a new fleet of helicopters arrived with an aviation unit at a base in Iraq, some soldiers took pictures on the flightline, he said. From the photos that were uploaded to the Internet, the enemy was able to determine the exact location of the helicopters inside the compound and conduct a mortar attack, destroying four of the AH-64 Apaches."

[Carriage Hill]

Do older phones have location tracking?

I still use one of these ancient things, for calls only:

http://www.cnet.com.au/nokia-6060-240055284.htm

Those new units are more than I need/want, too much tech for me.

[spetznaz]

"When a new fleet of helicopters arrived with an aviation unit at a base in Iraq, some soldiers took pictures on the flightline, he said. From the photos that were uploaded to the Internet, the enemy was able to determine the exact location of the helicopters inside the compound and conduct a mortar attack, destroying four of the AH-64 Apaches."

Loose lips sink ships.

[shadeaud]

So where is this 3rd world country getting such sophisticated equipment and who is training them/

[Safetgiver]

Answer #1.Iran. Answer #2 Russia.

[agere_contra]

I guess all they would need is Facebook and some mortars.

The ability to use photographs to recognize e.g. the corner of a base and work out which way is east is old school intelligence.