The FBI has resumed purchasing reams of Americans’ data and location histories to aid federal investigations, the agency’s director, Kash Patel, testified to lawmakers on Wednesday.
This is the first time since 2023 that the FBI has confirmed it was buying access to people’s data collected from data brokers, who source much of their information — including location data — from ordinary consumer phone apps and games, per Politico. At the time, then-FBI director Christopher Wray told senators that the agency had bought access to people’s location data in the past but that it was not actively purchasing it.
Read more…
Source: TechCrunch News
Sign up for the Cyber Security Review Newsletter
The latest cyber security news and insights delivered right to your inbox
Related:
- Kaspersky dismisses claims Coruna iPhone exploit kit is connected to NSA-linked operation
March 4, 2026
Russian cybersecurity outfit Kaspersky is waving away claims that an iPhone exploit kit recently uncovered by Google was developed by the same people who were behind a group of zero-days that allegedly compromised thousands of Russian diplomats in a 2023 campaign. After Google’s Threat Intelligence Group (GTIG) published its findings on the Coruna exploit kit this ...
- Major data leak forum dismantled in global action against cybercrime forum
March 4, 2026
A major online forum for stolen data has been dismantled following an international operation coordinated by Europol. The forum, known as LeakBase, had established itself as a central hub in the cybercrime ecosystem, specialising in the trade of leaked databases and so-called “stealer logs” – archives of stolen credentials harvested through infostealer malware. Accessible on the ...
- Hacktivists may have just cracked open ICE and exposed over 6,000 companies working with the DHS
March 3, 2026
A hacktivist group has claimed to have broken into systems belonging to the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and exposed sensitive files online. The group, with the self-awarded name “The Department of Peace”, stole data from the Office of Industry Partnership that contained contracts between DHS, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), and over 6,000 private ...
- Amazon Web Services data centres in the Middle East hit by Iran strikes
March 3, 2026
Amazon Inc has said two Amazon Web Services data centres in the United Arab Emirates were hit by drone strikes, with another facility in Bahrain damaged by a nearby attack, as Iran retaliated to the strikes by the US and Israel. AWS said the strikes caused “structural damage” and “disrupted power” to its infrastructure. It warned ...
- Hacked traffic cams and hijacked TVs: How cyber operations supported the war against Iran
March 3, 2026
On Saturday, U.S. and Israeli jets began a bombing campaign against Iran, killing its supreme leader Ali Khamenei and several senior government officials. The attacks also hit military and civilian targets all across the country, including a girls’ school, where at least 168 children and adults were killed. After a few days of conflict, multiple reports, ...
- LexisNexis hacked, 2 GB of structured data allegedly exposed
March 3, 2026
The hacker group FulcrumSec is taking responsibility for a data breach of information from LexisNexis. The group claims to have hacked into the LexisNexis servers on Feb. 24. It posted about the hack and alleged it got access to over 2 gigabytes of structured data. “We exfiltrated 2.04 GB of structured data from LexisNexis AWS infrastructure ...
