DETRACKTOR pouches will protect your phone from the intrusion of these IMSI Catcher devices.
Stingray (Harris corp) is an IMSI catcher device. Many other companies make these devices such as PKI and Septier. An IMSI catcher (International Mobile Subscriber Identity) is a telephony eavesdropping device used for intercepting mobile phone traffic and tracking movement of mobile phone users. Essentially a “fake” mobile tower acting between the target mobile phone(s) and the service provider’s real towers. These devices are capable of locating and tapping cell phones as well as changing the settings on your phone.
The problem is that this technology is not only available to law enforcement. Just like cell phone tapping software was originally only available to law enforcement this technology has not remained out of other’s hands. A hacker has even made one in 2010. Click here for more info.
This technology has been quite well developed and is offered by many companies and not all from the US. IMSI catchers can be bought directly online from China for $1800.00.
The devices, known as IMSI catchers or by a brand name, Stingray, used to be expensive, bulky and hard to purchase. Now they can be bought online for as little as $1,800 and can be as small as a briefcase.
“Today, a tech-savvy criminal or hobbyist can even build one using off-the-shelf equipment,” writes Stephanie Pell, a cyberethics fellow at the Army Cyber Institute at West Point.
But there’s enough evidence to alarm others, including the Federal Communications Commission, which set up a task force in August “to combat the illicit and unauthorized use of IMSI catchers.” Set up in response to congressional questioning, the task force will study the extent of IMSI catcher use by criminal gangs and foreign intelligence services.
Pell, of the Army Cyber Institute, says the real issue is the cell system’s underlying vulnerability. She sees it as a threat to national cybersecurity.
“Whatever effective monopoly the U.S. government once had over the use of IMSI catchers is now gone,” Pell writes in Wired. Fixing that flaw would hinder some law enforcement efforts, but that cost is outweighed by the benefit of knowing no foreign elements are listening in on government officials’ conversations, she says.