A French naval officer has inadvertently revealed the position of the aircraft carrier Charles de Gaulle after uploading a routine workout to a public fitness app.
The officer recorded a run on deck using Strava, a widely used fitness platform, with the data then published to a public profile. The route, effectively a loop around the carrier’s flight deck, made it possible to pinpoint the ship’s location in the eastern Mediterranean, northwest of Cyprus.
President Emmanuel Macron announced earlier this month that the carrier strike group would move from the Baltic to the Middle East in response to escalating tensions linked to Iran, including drone attacks affecting allied territory. What is sensitive, however, is the precision and timing of the data. While adversaries may broadly know where such a task group is operating, near real-time location information removes a layer of uncertainty that naval forces rely on.
The carrier itself sits at the centre of a sizeable multinational formation. Alongside French escorts and support vessels, the group includes contributions from allied navies and further French ships are already in theatre, with additional assets expected as part of a larger naval presence tied to the current crisis.
Incidents involving fitness apps are not new, but they continue to occur. Platforms such as Strava automatically log and map activity unless users adjust their privacy settings, and previous cases have exposed everything from forward operating bases to patrol routes.
The Charles de Gaulle, France’s only aircraft carrier, carries a mix of Rafale fighter jets, airborne early warning aircraft and helicopters, and is a central element of French and allied operations. Its movements are closely managed, particularly during periods of heightened tension. That a simple fitness upload could cut through those protections is unlikely to go unnoticed.
Zut alors…….
Sacre Bleu!
Wow. Phones are needed for morale purposes so not sure how they will stop this. Maybe source an app which blocks all geolocation data on phones & tablets?!
Being sunk at sea has also been known to have a negative effects on morale too…..
Honestly it’s not the first time it’s happened and won’t be the last.
To be fair, its hard to hide an aircraft carrier in the relatively confined and congested waters of the Eastern Mediterranean anyway!
I take the point if it was in the Atlantic or Indo pacific though, that could have been a problem…
And this is why we need military bases to increasingly ban personal electronics and vehicles. The most basic of tech now is constantly scanning and collating information wherever it goes.
We can’t trust the company statements of ‘heaven forbid we would never do that, we’re the lovely tech company not that bad one’
It’s already started with Chinese vehicles being banned but if we really want to be serious about security all will have to do more.
The problem is; good luck with recruitment and retention if you ban some pretty fundamental parts of modern life.
That’s Social Media for you!
Clearly I am a ‘Grumpy Git’.
There was a study few years ago that showed that fitbit gave away locations of Iraq instalation and the routes they took.
It wasn’t a study and it wasn’t Iraq. IIRC it was Garmin celebrating an anniversary and it did a “look at all the running routes our users have done world wide” release, which showed up a loop that was run very consistently in Syria and was assumed to be a US SOCOM base.
*edit* It might also have been Strava not Garmin.
I think this happened with fitness aps in the UK as well, runners looping around the perimeter of some places.
Not much one can do?
I was onboard a T Boat when we were escorted through the Suez Canal by HMS Northumberland, the ships company were forced to surrender all mobile phones etc prior to being informed of their tasking. I’m sure this kind of process is still in place on warships at sea but being a Submariner it’s a bit different for us. We don’t tend to get a signal in a steel war Canoe.
Don’t you just love the modern world? With the revelation that the Israelis hacked the Tehran traffic cameras to house key government figures, maybe people will stop griping about the UK government cooling on Chinese tech? How easy would it be for the Chinese to hack systems made by Huawei? The Spaniards of course continue to embrace their Chinese friends even allowing them to build their telephone intercept technology. No wonder they on pay lip service to Nato membership.