The NSA tracks the location of hundreds of millions of phones

The Washington Post is reporting new details on the NSA's massive phone-record collection efforts, with leaked documents that indicate the program caches five billion call records each day, tracking the locations of hundreds of millions of mobile devices. Previous Snowden leaks had detailed the NSA's extensive access to consumer phone records, but it was unclear before now whether that metadata included the location of each phone. One collection manager told the post the NSA was collecting "vast volumes" of location data from around the world, primarily by tapping into the cables that connect mobile networks globally, but insisted the collection is "incidental" rather than intentional and is focused on phones outside of the United States.

via Tech News Headlines - Yahoo! News http://www.theverge.com/2013/12/4/5175778/the-nsa-tracks-the-location-of-hundreds-of-millions-of-phones