The U.S. Department of Defense has turned off advertising tracking on government-issued phones and computers used by military personnel, a move confirmed in a letter shared with Senator Ron Wyden. The letter states that the Army, Air Force, Navy, Marine Corps, and Special Operations Command have all disabled advertising tracking across their devices. This applies to iPhones, Android devices, and Windows computers managed through the federal military enterprise network. The action follows reports that hostile governments have used commercially available location data to target American service members.
According to the letter, the military implemented these protections earlier this year, with the Air Force making its changes as recently as July. The goal is to prevent adversaries from using location data pulled from apps on troops' devices to strike them on the battlefield or at their bases. App location data is frequently shared with third-party firms and data brokers, who then sell it on the open market. By disabling the advertising ID, troops become much harder to single out, as their location information blends in with other users who have also turned off that identifier.
Senator Wyden, a senior Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee and a prominent privacy advocate, raised the issue earlier this year in a letter to military leaders. He acted after learning that unnamed foreign adversaries had used commercially obtained location data to target U.S. troops stationed in the Middle East. While Wyden praised the military's decision to reduce advertising tracking, he also cautioned that personal devices belonging to troops and contractors are still a potential vulnerability. He noted that those personal devices, when brought onto military bases, could expose service members and facilities to similar attacks.
The U.S. government has acknowledged the risk that this data poses to its forces. At the same time, the intelligence community and the FBI have confirmed that they purchase such location data for surveillance and intelligence purposes without obtaining a warrant. That acknowledgment underscores a broader tension: the same commercial data that can endanger troops is also seen as a tool for domestic agencies. Wyden's office shared the letter with TechCrunch, which reported on the development alongside Reuters.
Military leaders have not publicly detailed the specific technical steps taken to disable the tracking, nor have they commented on the timeline beyond what was shared in the letter. The move appears to be a direct response to a growing threat landscape where everyday mobile advertising infrastructure can be repurposed for targeting. For U.S. troops, this means their official devices now carry less identifiable location signatures. The change does not address the risk from personal devices, which remain outside the Pentagon's direct control. The Defense Department has not responded publicly to the senator's broader concerns about those gaps.
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