The position of a French aircraft carrier in the Mediterranean was laid bare by a sailor's publicly accessible fitness app activity, a report has revealed.
France's flagship carrier, Charles de Gaulle, had its location near Cyprus exposed when a young officer recorded a 36-minute exercise session on a public Strava profile, effectively allowing users to follow the vessel's movements live, Le Monde reported.
Used by an estimated 120 million people worldwide, Strava allows users to track and publish their running and cycling sessions on the internet.
According to information obtained by the outlet, the crew member logged a run exceeding four miles via his smartwatch on March 13, circling the deck of the near-900 ft carrier and locating it around 62 miles from the Turkish shoreline, roughly two weeks after US-Israeli strikes on Iran. France had confirmed the deployment of the ship on March 3.
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Another publicly accessible profile appears to have shared location-tagged exercise sessions from a separate French Navy ship on an operational mission, including photographs of the deck, crew and gym equipment.
The newspaper reported that it cross-checked the details with satellite imagery captured shortly after the workout, confirming the presence of the 262-metre-long nuclear-powered ship in the area.
The French Armed Forces General Staff acknowledged the incident, stating that posting this kind of data was inconsistent with digital security guidelines, and said the chain of command would take “appropriate measures”.
According to Le Monde, members of French President Emmanuel Macron's security team, as well as those protecting US presidents and Russian President Vladimir Putin, were still using the app as recently as last year, unintentionally exposing their identities through its location-sharing function.
An agent protecting Joe Biden logged a run during his 2023 trip to San Francisco, where he met Xi Jinping, tracing the route on a fitness app. The publication reported that details from the Strava profile allowed it to pinpoint the hotel used during the visit.
The lapse comes as US President Donald Trump calls on allies to strengthen security around the Strait of Hormuz, a crucial artery for global trade amid rising tensions in the Gulf. Although the US Department of War has prohibited the use of fitness trackers and wearable devices, France has repeatedly encountered problems linked to Strava.
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