The Liberty Daily 
- The U.S. and European intelligence agencies are purchasing commercial personal data harvested from the advertising ecosystem.
- This practice, called advertising-based intelligence or AdInt, allows agencies to access location, political views, and religious beliefs.
- Oversight bodies lack authority to review or block government contracts with data brokers.
- The same datasets bought by Western agencies are equally available to foreign adversaries.
- Stronger regulation and oversight would reduce national security vulnerabilities created by AdInt.
(Natural News)—The digital advertising industry that tracks your every move for profit has found a new customer: your own government.
A report published Tuesday by Interface, a European tech policy think tank, reveals that U.S. and European intelligence agencies are spending millions of taxpayer dollars to purchase commercially available personal data harvested from the advertising ecosystem. This practice, known as advertising-based intelligence or AdInt, represents one of the most significant and largely unregulated shifts in modern surveillance.
What they’re buying
The report gathered evidence from 11 intelligence oversight bodies across democratic nations. “Via commercial vendors, national security agencies typically purchase access to a constantly updated stream of bulk data. That data contains information on mobile devices’ unique IDs, their precise location over time, as well as granular profile data of individual app users linked to these devices,” said Thorsten Wetzling, one of the study’s authors.
Among the sensitive details these datasets can expose are a person’s whereabouts, age, gender, political views, sexual orientation, religious beliefs, and who they communicate with.
This information originates from online ad auctions, software embedded in apps, social media platforms, and internet-connected devices. Data brokers aggregate and sell it to anyone willing to pay, including intelligence agencies that acquire it through a range of procurement channels, sometimes using front companies to conceal their identity.
Agencies caught in the act
In the United States, the FBI has previously acknowledged purchasing location data derived from online advertising, although bureau director Christopher Wray testified in 2023 that the practice had since been replaced by a court-authorized process. U.S. Customs and Border Protection ran a pilot program from 2019 to 2021 that acquired location information from mobile app software and digital advertising systems. An internal Department of Homeland Security report found that some agencies had violated federal law through purchases of commercial location data.
In Europe, Austria’s Interior Ministry procured the surveillance tool Tangles, which includes a plug-in capable of analyzing ad-derived location data. France’s foreign intelligence service asked lawmakers in 2021 to create a legal basis for purchasing internet browsing records from private companies — a request that has yet to be granted.
Oversight bodies powerless to stop it
The findings are deeply concerning for anyone who values privacy. Researchers surveyed oversight practitioners and found that several lack the authority to review, reshape, or block government contracts with data brokers. Nearly all delegations surveyed said they are not notified when new contracts are signed, and not one has the binding authority to delay or prevent such contracts from being concluded.
“These practices are gaining momentum, not just in the United States where this has been reported more widely, but also across Europe,” Wetzling said. The report notes that existing laws have failed to keep pace with the advertising data industry, leaving a regulatory vacuum that intelligence agencies have been quietly exploiting.
The accountability gap
Investigative reporting has shown how easily 3.6 billion location data points — covering millions of individuals, including military personnel, intelligence staff, and senior government officials — can be purchased on the open market. The practice creates national security risks too: close cooperation with private firms and reliance on vast datasets may expose agencies and personnel to exploitation by hostile actors.
Most oversight bodies said they are legally barred from publicly disclosing the extent to which their intelligence communities are buying commercial data. And while auditing data-sharing arrangements technically falls within most oversight mandates, not a single delegation reported having actually conducted such an audit where commercially sourced data was involved.
Will anyone stop them?
The report makes it clear that stronger regulation and effective oversight do not have to come at the expense of national security. In fact, the authors argue the opposite. Left unchecked, AdInt creates serious vulnerabilities: the same datasets purchased by Western agencies are equally available to foreign adversaries, who are already using them.
This is not just a European problem or an American problem. This is a human rights problem. Your data, collected without meaningful consent, is being weaponized by governments that have no business knowing where you sleep, who you love, or what you believe. The only way to stop it is to demand our elected officials close these legal loopholes before every private thought becomes a government data point.
