Chuck Darwin<p>Cell Site Simulators ( <a href="https://c.im/tags/CSS" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>CSS</span></a> ), also known as <a href="https://c.im/tags/IMSI" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>IMSI</span></a> catchers, <br>are among law enforcement’s most closely-guarded secret surveillance tools. </p><p>They act like real cell phone towers, <br>🔸“tricking” mobile devices into connecting to them, <br>🔸designed to intercept the information that phones send and receive, <br>🔸like the location of the user and metadata for phone calls, text messages, and other app traffic. </p><p>CSS are highly invasive and are used covertly. </p><p>In the past, law enforcement used a technique called <br>“parallel construction”<br>—collecting evidence in a different way to reach an existing conclusion <br>💥in order to avoid disclosing how law enforcement originally collected it💥<br>—. 👉to circumvent public disclosure of location findings made through CSS. 👈</p><p>This technology is like a dragging fishing net, rather than a focused single hook in the water. </p><p>Every phone in the vicinity connects with the device; <br>🔥even people completely unrelated to an investigation get wrapped up in the surveillance. 🔥</p><p>CSS, like other surveillance technologies, subjects civilians to widespread data collection, <br>even those who have not been involved with a crime, <br>and has been used against protestors and other protected groups, undermining their civil liberties. </p><p>⭐️Their adoption should require public disclosure, <br>⭐️but this rarely occurs.</p><p>In Massachusetts, agencies are expected to get a <a href="https://c.im/tags/warrant" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>warrant</span></a> before conducting any cell-based location tracking. <br>The City of Boston is known to own a CSS. </p><p>Dozens of policing agencies are currently using cell-site simulators (CSS) by <a href="https://c.im/tags/Jacobs" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Jacobs</span></a> <a href="https://c.im/tags/Technology" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Technology</span></a> and its Engineering Integration Group (EIG), according to newly-available documents on how that company provides CSS capabilities to local law enforcement. </p><p>A proposal document from Jacobs Technology, <br>provided to the Massachusetts State Police (MSP) and first spotted by the Boston Institute for Nonprofit Journalism (BINJ), <br>outlines elements of the company’s CSS services, which include discreet integration of the CSS system into a Chevrolet Silverado and lifetime technical support .</p><p>The proposal document from Jacobs provides some of the most comprehensive information about modern CSS that the public has had access to in years. </p><p>It confirms that law enforcement has access to CSS<br>♦️capable of operating on 5G <br>♦️as well as older cellular standards. </p><p>It also gives us our first look at modern CSS hardware. </p><p>The Jacobs system runs on at least nine software-defined radios that simulate cellular network protocols on multiple frequencies<br> and can also gather <a href="https://c.im/tags/wifi" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>wifi</span></a> intelligence. </p><p>As these documents describe, these CSS are meant to be concealed within a common vehicle. </p><p>Antennas are hidden under a false roof so nothing can be seen outside the vehicles, <br>which is a shift from the more visible antennas and cargo van-sized deployments we’ve seen before. </p><p>The system also comes with a TRACHEA2+ and JUGULAR2+ for 🔹direction finding and 🔹mobile direction finding. </p><p>Important to the MSP contract is the modification of a Chevrolet Silverado with the CSS system. </p><p>This includes both the surreptitious installment of the CSS hardware into the truck and the integration of its software user interface into the navigational system of the vehicle. </p><p>According to Jacobs, this is the kind of installation with which they have a lot of experience.</p><p>Jacobs has built its CSS project on military and intelligence community relationships, <br>which are now informing development of a tool used in domestic communities, <br>not foreign warzones. </p><p><a href="https://c.im/tags/Harris" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Harris</span></a> <a href="https://c.im/tags/Corporation" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Corporation</span></a>, later <a href="https://c.im/tags/L3Harris" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>L3Harris</span></a> <a href="https://c.im/tags/Technologies" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Technologies</span></a>, Inc., <br>was the largest provider of CSS technology to domestic law enforcement <br>but stopped selling to non-federal agencies in 2020. </p><p>Once Harris stopped selling to local law enforcement the market was open to several competitors, <br>one of the largest of which was <a href="https://c.im/tags/KeyW" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>KeyW</span></a> <a href="https://c.im/tags/Corporation" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Corporation</span></a>. </p><p>Following👉 Jacobs’s 2019 acquisition of The KeyW Corporation 👈and its Engineering Integration Group (EIG), <br>Jacobs is now a leading provider of CSS to police, <br>and it claims to have <br>🌟more than 300 current CSS deployments globally. 🌟</p><p><a href="https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2024/06/next-generation-cell-site-simulators-here-heres-what-we-know" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" translate="no" target="_blank"><span class="invisible">https://www.</span><span class="ellipsis">eff.org/deeplinks/2024/06/next</span><span class="invisible">-generation-cell-site-simulators-here-heres-what-we-know</span></a></p>