(ReclaimingAmerica.net) – Over 10 million American citizens’ cell phones were monitored by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) during the COVID lockdowns.
According to the publication Motherboard, in documents they obtained from the CDC, the agency purchased harvested cell phone data about the activities and locations of United States citizens during the shutdown.
The information detailed if people were following COVID-related curfews, if people were visiting schools, and specifics related to Navajo Native Americans.
The CDC says it was simply using the information to develop trends of how people moved around and where they went. The phone data can provide details of an individual’s travel destinations and where they reside and work.
The data CDC paid for came from SafeGraph and was purchased for $420,000. The information they put together is considered controversial. SafeGraph is a data broker, and the Google Play Store has now banned the company.
As an example of why they obtained the details from SafeGraph, CDC stated that it “has been critical for ongoing response efforts, such as hourly monitoring of activity in curfew zones or detailed counts of visits to participating pharmacies for vaccine monitoring.”
Along with CDC’s preoccupation with knowing if Americans visited pharmacies and schools, there seemed to be a focus on “places of worship.”
A cybersecurity researcher, Zach Edwards, related to Motherboard, “The CDC seems to have purposefully created an open-ended list of use cases….” He was quick to add that visits within neighborhoods and a look at violent activity were also of interest to the CDC.
The information obtained through a FOIA request by Motherboard included 21 “potential CDC use cases for data.”
Motherboard noted conservatives have used the COVID-19 pandemic to protest government practices of vaccine mandates. According to the tech guide, other groups “promote fear” by saying vaccine passports and certificates could be used as additional surveillance opportunities by the Biden administration.
