Edward Snowden says intelligence agencies in the U.S. and UK have the ability to hack into citizen’s phones and take control of their devices. The famous U.S. whistleblower says the agencies could use an encrypted text message to take pictures and listen to conversations.
According to Snowden, UK intelligence agency, GCHQ, named its secret monitoring program after the popular eighties cartoon “The Smurfs.” He says the GCHQ has a whole “Smurf Suite” named for different capabilities.
For instance, “Tracker Smurf is a geo-location tool which allows [GCHQ] to follow you with a greater precision than you would get from the typical triangulation of cellphone towers,” Snowden explained.
Snowden told the BBC’s Panorama, the technology would allow the agency to see “who you call, what you’ve texted, the things you’ve browsed, the list of your contacts, the places you’ve been” and “the wireless networks that your phone is associated with.”
“Nosey Smurf is the ‘hot mic’ tool. For example if it’s in your pocket, [GCHQ] can turn the microphone on and listen to everything that’s going on around you – even if your phone is switched off because they’ve got the other tools for turning it on.”
Paranoid Smurf is “a self-protection tool that’s used to armour [GCHQ’s] manipulation of your phone. For example, if you wanted to take the phone in to get it serviced because you saw something strange going on or you suspected something was wrong, it makes it much more difficult for any technician to realise that anything’s gone amiss.”
”Dreamy Smurf is the power management tool which means turning your phone on and off with you knowing,” he added.
The GCHQ is not the only government agency to have such a program. Snowden says the NSA has similar technology to the Smurf Suite. “GCHQ is to all intents and purposes a subsidiary of the NSA,” he said. “They [the NSA] provide technology, they provide tasking and direction as to what they [GCHQ] should go after.”
While Snowden says both the GCHQ and the NSA have invested heavily in the monitoring technology, he doesn’t believe either agency has any intentions of using the technology for mass monitoring. “They want to own your phone instead of you,” he said.
