Much of the alleged illegal surveillance equipment in the Oslo area, discovered by the newspaper Aftenposten just before Christmas, has now been turned off, the newspaper reports. Aftenposten reported in mid-December that it had located a number of fake base stations for mobile phones, which were allegedly used to monitor mobile phone traffic in the Oslo area. The newspaper wrote that it had registered a number of so-called IMSI – catchers operating near key official buildings in Oslo, such as the Parliament (Stortinget), the Prime Minister’s residence and other key political buildings and financial central.
The paper writes Monday that new tests show that most of the equipment has now been turned off, but that in a few places the equipment is still in operation.
These units are small eavesdropping devices which are used to intercept and record mobile phone traffic and tracking the movements of mobile phone users, and are usually undetectable for the ordinary cell phone user.
There are so far no indications of who may have deployed the alleged eavesdropping devices, but speculations range from criminal organisations to foreign powers.
(Aftenposten/NRK)
