Rogue phone towers that have been found across the US could be listening in on ordinary people's private phone conversations, an investigation has found.
A report by Popular Science magazine discovered fake phone masts that are capable of eavesdropping on people's calls and installing spyware on their phones.
Around the country, 17 different false towers – also known as "interceptors" were located, many of which appear to be built on US military bases.
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The towers were discovered by people using a customised Android device called the CryptoPhone 500. This phone uses bespoke software to inform its user if their device is being subjected to what is known as a "baseband attack," Sky News says. It is then possible to trace where the attack originated.
Les Goldsmith, chief executive of security firm ESD America, told Popular Science: "Interceptor use in the US is much higher than people had anticipated. One of our customers took a road trip from Florida to North Carolina and he found eight different interceptors on that trip. We even found one at a casino in Las Vegas."
He added: "What we find suspicious is that a lot of these interceptors are right on top of US military bases. So we begin to wonder – are some of them US government interceptors? … Is it just the US military, or are they foreign governments doing it? The point is: we don't really know whose they are."
Android and Apple phones are incapable of detecting the phony towers, Popular Science says, but a Cryptophone will set off an alert showing that a tower with no name – a "telltale sign" of a rogue base station – is attempting to communicate with your device. Standard towers run by official operators like Verizon or T-Mobile will have a name, whereas interceptors often do not, the magazine reports.
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