More than 150 organisations are able to monitor the data usage on mobile devices, particularly with the massive rise in the popularity of smartphones.
Wikileaks boss Julian Assange told journalists at a press conference yesterday “Mass interception of entire populations is not only a reality; it is a secret new industry spanning 25 countries.”
He went on to warn press representatives “Who here has an iPhone? Who here has a BlackBerry? Who here uses Gmail? Well, you’re all screwed.”
The controversial head of the Wikileaks website, who has recently been embroiled in allegations of sexual misconduct in Sweden, was launching the publication of a new cache of secrets, simply called the ‘Spy Files’.
The intention of the latest Wikileaks secret documents leak, in collaboration with the website spyfiles.org, is “mass attack on this mass surveillance industry”.
MyTNT Blog: We’ve got a file on you – do we mind being tracked?
Users can visit the spyfiles website and see the companies named and shamed that are allegedly involved in wide scale phone monitoring techniques. One of the biggest offenders in the UK according to Wikileaks and Spyfiles is a company called the Gamma Group.
He announced “Today we release over 287 files documenting the reality of the international mass surveillance industry – an industry which now sells equipment to dictators and democracies alike in order to intercept entire populations.”
Speaking at a conference which took place at City University in London, Assange said that the organisations named had been using phones as tracking devices, intercepting calls and selling the information transmitted not only by specific people but of “entire populations”.
Main photograph: LEON NEAL/AFP/Getty Images