Army cautions units, personnel against using smart phone app

The Army has issued a circular to its units and personnel cautioning them against using the caller identification smart phone application 'Truecaller' in the backdrop of cases where suspected Pakistani spies have allegedly used it to establish the identity of its officers.
The application is owned by a European company and helps the user to establish the identity of an unknown caller using its global database of mobile and telephone numbers.
There have been cases where suspected Pakistani spies have used the application to establish the identity of Army officers and made phone calls to them or their families trying to gather information from them, Army sources said.

If someone gets hold of one number in a closed user group subscribers, it can be used to establish the identity of other members of the group as the numbers are similar, they said.
The circular was issued to warn the officers and personnel of the ways the application can be misused and the precautions to be taken while having it on their smart phones, they said.
In the recent past, the Army had also asked its personnel not to use social media applications such as WeChat which may have servers abroad.
The army is worried that activity on the social media could lead to identification of the army officers and others and their location.

In the past, there have been cases where army officers have been honey-trapped by suspected agents working for Pakistan's ISI and they have faced strict action from the force.