Unidentified governments are surveilling smartphone users by tracking push notifications that move through Google's and Apple's servers, a US senator warned on Wednesday (via Reuters). The traffic flowing from apps that send push notifications put the companies "in a unique position to facilitate government surveillance of how users are using particular apps," Wyden said. In a statement given to Reuters, Apple said that Wyden's letter gave them the opening they needed to share more details with the public about how governments monitored push notifications. A source familiar with the matter confirmed that both foreign and U.S. government agencies have been asking Apple and Google for metadata related to push notifications. Apple advises developers not to include sensitive data in notifications and to encrypt any data before adding it to a notification payload.

Source: New York Times December 06, 2023 14:47 UTC