(Updated: September 21, 2017)
Since the Snowden revelations, nosotros know that signals intelligence agencies are trying to acquire large sets of telephone metadata inwards social club to analyse them inwards back upwardly of protecting their national security.
Less known is that commercial companies also analyse similar large information sets, albeit for interrogation purposes in addition to amongst personal information beingness anonymized.
Now, a interrogation written report from the Netherlands provides us amongst actual numbers of mobile telephone metadata, which tin live used to compare amongst the numbers that NSA in addition to GCHQ collected according to the Snowden documents.
Tourist movements
Recently published was a report virtually visitor movements inwards in addition to approximately the Dutch majuscule of Amsterdam. It was prepared past times the economical interrogation companionship Decisio on behalf of the province of Noord-Holland in addition to the municipalities of Amsterdam in addition to Zandvoort.
Since a few years, Amsterdam almost suffers from a huge growth of tourists, but it was hard to acquire detailed insights inwards where they come upwardly from, where they rest in addition to which areas of the city, equally good equally which surrounding towns are most popular.
Now, these insights became available past times using information from the "tracking device" carried past times almost every individual: the mobile phone.
Anonymized information sets
Decisio acquired a huge laid of mobile telephone metadata from Vodafone, which is the 2nd largest provider inwards the Netherlands, amongst over v i thou 1000 customers. When they utilization their mobile phones, they connect to i of the 32.000 jail cellphone towers or base of operations stations, which associate the telephone issue amongst a location.
Each month, Vodafone provides these information to some other interrogation companionship called Mezuro, which processes in addition to analyses them to map the movements using a grid of 1250 regions containing multiple base of operations station cells. The results were thus analysed past times Decisio in addition to compared amongst other information sources.
But earlier that, the Vodafone metadata were anonymized past times replacing every telephone issue amongst a random issue that changes every month. Foreign telephone numbers were replaced daily. Also, exclusively the movements of groups of to a greater extent than than xv numbers were reported, thus it's impossible to rail the movements of private telephone users.
Development of the average issue of daily mobile telephone transactions
from Vodafone users betwixt Jan 2013 in addition to September 2015
(source: Decisio interrogation report)
Mobile telephone metadata
Most interesting parts of the written report are the details virtually the telephone metadata: Mezuro periodically receives information virtually some three i thou 1000 Vodafone telephone numbers that are active on a daily basis. These phones generated 400 i thou 1000 "transactions", or Call Detail Records (CDRs) a day.
These transactions are the moments that a mobile telephone connects to a jail cellphone tower, non exclusively for a telephone telephone band or a text message (SMS), but increasingly ofttimes for a social media posting, sending or receiving an e-mail, a Google search or checking a website - for Dutch users, this is on average 100 times a day. Besides these communication transactions, mobile phones also connect to jail cellphone towers without transmitting whatsoever sort of message; these non-communication transactions are exclusively stored for upwardly to a few hours.
An article from Oct 2013 virtually Mezuro says that the companionship analyzed some 150 i thou 1000 information points daily in addition to that an average smartphone connects 150 to 200 times a twenty-four hours amongst a jail cellphone tower.
This issue was confirmed during a parliamentary hearing inwards Germany, when someone from BND explained that i jail cellphone telephone generates betwixt 100 in addition to 200 metadata in addition to work organization records a day.
Update: similar numbers come from the Russian billing (and interception) companionship Peter-Service, which installs billing installations capable of eighteen i thou 1000 subscribers creating 2,851 billion transactions a day, which equals 158 transactions per individual per day.
If nosotros accept these metadata equally the rows of a (database) table, each of them incorporate multiple fields, corresponding to columns for information pieces similar for example the issue calling, the issue called, date, time, jail cellphone tower location, in addition to information needed to transfer diverse types of messages.
Multiplying
For the tourism research, the Vodafone information were multiplied inwards social club to acquire the numbers for the total population. The multiplier changes daily depending on the twenty-four hours of the week, holidays, etc, but lies roughly approximately v (for unusual visitors it's much to a greater extent than hard to calculate this number).
As this total also includes people who don't utilization a mobile phone, the multiplier for the total issue of metadata must live lower. According to the report, the users of the Vodafone network work organization human relationship for 1/3 of all mobile telephone users inwards the Netherlands, thus hither nosotros tin utilization three equally multiplier.
That makes that inwards 2016, all Dutch mobile phones generated some 1200 i thou 1000 transactions a day. In a calendar month that's over 36 billion in addition to inwards a twelvemonth 432 billion telephone metadata records.
For comparing amongst the numbers from the Snowden documents, nosotros induce got to expect for the numbers from early on 2013. The nautical chart from the written report shows that inwards Jan 2013, at that spot were ca. 85 i thou 1000 transactions past times Vodafone users a day, which makes 255 i thou 1000 for all Dutch users. In a calendar month that's 7,65 billion.
Numbers from BOUNDLESSINFORMANT
Now, let's accept a expect at some of the numbers from the Snowden revelations. For the Netherlands at that spot was a nautical chart from the NSA tool BOUNDLESSINFORMANT, which shows 1,8 i thou 1000 telephone metadata records for xxx days approximately Jan 1, 2013.
Initially it was idea that this were Dutch information sucked upwardly past times NSA, but later it came out that they were genuinely collected past times Dutch armed forces intelligence,
Now that nosotros know that inwards the same menstruum of time, the Dutch mobile telephone users lone already accounted for over vii billion metadata, 1,8 i thou 1000 is a tiny number, peradventure generated past times non to a greater extent than than 2500 smartphones. In Afghanistan, quondam fashioned jail cellphone phones may induce got created less transactions, thus the 1,8 i thou 1000 metadata could induce got been the traffic captured from a minor town.
Update: On Twitter, a Dutch journalist involved amongst the Snowden revelations said that the 1,8 i thou 1000 records correspond some 12 i thou 1000 pieces of metadata (which agency i tape consists of at to the lowest degree half-dozen fields) in addition to that the Dutch Ministry of Defence had confirmed that they were collected from Somalia.
The BOUNDLESSINFORMANT nautical chart for the Netherlands amongst data
collected from Dec 10, 2012 to Jan 8, 2013
(click to enlarge)
Late 2013, major European newspapers published similar charts for other countries too, i time again claiming that they showed how many telephone calls NSA was intercepting. But fifty-fifty if those claims were true, the lxx i thou 1000 the BOUNDLESSINFORMANT nautical chart presented for France, lx i thou 1000 for Spain, 45 i thou 1000 for Italia in addition to 33 i thou 1000 for Norway, are tiny numbers given the actual 7,65 billion metadata for a minor province similar the Netherlands.
Even the 552 i thou 1000 metadata inwards the chart for Germany doesn't come upwardly close. If the Netherlands amongst some sixteen i thou 1000 people generated 7,65 billion mobile telephone metadata a month, thus for eighty i thou 1000 German linguistic communication citizens that issue would live over 38 billion.
And to live clear: the information represented inwards these specific BOUNDLESSINFORMANT charts were non collected past times NSA inwards Europe, but shared amongst NSA past times European intelligence agencies, equally business office of their armed forces cooperation inwards diverse crisis zones.
NSA in addition to GCHQ totals
Finally, nosotros tin expect at how many telephony metadata NSA in addition to GCHQ collect inwards total in addition to compare that amongst the numbers from the Netherlands. In 2012, the British GCHQ "was treatment 600m "telephone events" each day" - according to Snowden documents seen past times The Guardian.
This seems a surprisingly minor issue compared to the 225 i thou 1000 transactions generated past times Dutch users, but it's possible that the 600 i thou 1000 exclusively apply to traditional telephone in addition to SMS metadata, excluding the mesh information from smartphones.
The NSA collected a total of 135 billion telephone metadata a calendar month during the start one-half of 2012. This is some 17 times the amount for the Netherlands equally a whole - i time again non a real excessive number, equally it would roughly equal the telephone metadata of approximately 300 i thou 1000 people, which is to a greater extent than or less the population inwards the Middle East.
The volumes of NSA metadata collection betwixt Jan in addition to June 2012
(click to enlarge)
Conclusion
During the Snowden revelations, the press was eager to acquaint numbers virtually NSA in addition to GCHQ information collection that seemed impressingly high. But non a unmarried media outlet took the fourth dimension or endeavour to come upwardly up amongst the total numbers of telephone in addition to mesh communications, needed to lay them inwards the correct perspective.
From the interrogation written report virtually Amsterdam tourism nosotros lastly learned what the actual issue of mobile telephone metadata for a western province expect like. Although nosotros withal don't know how just NSA in addition to GCHQ are counting their metadata, comparing them to the numbers from the Netherlands shows that their collection efforts may live non equally excessive equally initially thought.
Links in addition to sources
- Decisio: Bezoekersstromen Amsterdam - Zandvoort (2017)
- Autoriteit Consument & Markt: Telecommonitor eerste kwartaal 2016 (2016)
- ITU: Innovation of tourism statistics through the utilization of novel large information sources (2014)
- CBS: Rapportage projection touching on ICT; Mobiele telefonie (2013)
- Data Management: Building a Data Warehouse of Call Data Records (CDR): Solution Considerations (2012)
One interesting effect from the tourism written report is that touchstone the issue of visitors of Amsterdam's annual Gay Pride showed that instead of the 560.000 visitors according to the organisation, exclusively 115.000 visitors came from exterior the urban pith center, additional to the 235.000 people who are acquaint on every Sabbatum in addition to may or may non induce got watched the event. This confirms that visitor numbers for gratis world events are ofttimes significantly exaggerated.
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