The methods of surveillance have changed over time. Nowadays, government agencies do not need to follow someone to track their activities. Mobile phone users, unknowingly, hand over their privacy rights to the tech companies that in turn sell it to government contractors. A popular Muslim prayer app, named Salaat First, found selling users location data to its partner that has customers with the US government agencies including the FBI and the ICE.
Salaat First, which reminds its users about Muslim prayer timings, has been downloaded over 10 million times on Android. To accurately tell users prayer times, Salaat First asks for permission to read precise location, has access to device ID, phone, media storage, USB storage and full network access. However, the app developer was selling the same user data to its partner, a French firm named Predicio.