Mapping Service Blurs Out Military Bases, But Accidentally Locates Secret Ones

schwit1 shares a report from Popular Mechanics: A Russian online mapping company was trying to obscure foreign military bases. But in doing so, it accidentally confirmed their locations -- many of which were secret. Yandex Maps, Russia's leading online map service, blurred the precise locations of Turkish and Israeli military bases, pinpointing their location. The bases host sensitive surface-to-air missile sites and facilities housing nuclear weapons. The Federation of American Scientists reports that Yandex Maps blurred out "over 300 distinct buildings, airfields, ports, bunkers, storage sites, bases, barracks, nuclear facilities, and random buildings" in the two countries. Some of these facilities were well known, but some of them were not. Not only has Yandex confirmed their locations, the scope of blurring reveals their exact size and shape.

Comments

They were not secret

[mapkinase]

No military installation in the world of the size of the large university campus is secret.

The secret could be details within that location, that's what map service provides by blurring.

Stop posting idiotic articles.

Re:They were not secret

[Anonymous Coward]

No military installation in the world of the size of the large university campus is secret.

The secret could be details within that location, that's what map service provides by blurring.

Stop posting idiotic articles.

It's BeauHD.

It's a stupid article about RUSSIA.

It's like chumming for sharks - and the sharks are smarter.

Re:They were not secret

[Z00L00K]

It's sometimes a gray area if a place is secret or not. But using the map would also be a good way to reveal what's supposed to be secret but isn't known that it's revealed.

If you as a map provider want to play it nice then you just replace items that are specific for that location with generic vehicles or generic trees copied from another part of the same area. Just keep the roads and buildings as is and nobody would be wiser.

Re:They were not secret

[Misagon]

BTW, it is not only military installations that get blurred out. Critical infrastructure installations often also gets blurred out on maps. For example power grid stations, nuclear power plants and radar installations used by commercial air traffic.

Re:They were not secret

[mrbester]

Depends on the definition of "secret". If the location is classified as "secret" by US, there's no onus on a foreign entity abiding by that classification, if they are even aware of it.

Google (US, and probably others) has to but Yandex (RU) doesn't unless there is some agreement in place. Even then, what's the blowback if they don't?

Re:They were not secret

[Anonymous Coward]

The mere fact that Yandex got the information, means it isn't secret.

Re:They were not secret

[Anonymous Coward]

Good points. Now, what do the Yandex map look like for Russian military bases? Do they show the base layout? Or a blur? Or a fake town/forest?

Re:They were not secret

[azcoyote]

Wait, you mean that gigantic and obvious airfield with military planes flying around it might be a military base? Who knew.

Re:They were not secret

[Anonymous Coward]

Indeed these are blurred bases. It's a high time for fiction to catch up and make the villain's lair a blurred base instead of a secret one. Even special effects cost less with the reduced accuracy.

Re:They were not secret

[Anonymous Coward]

LAWL.

It's not like you pay to access this website. Until you do, you have no say nor do you have the right to demand to have any say in the day-to-day operations of slashdot.

You egotistical shit.

Re:They were not secret

[lgw]

Even then, what's the blowback if they don't?

The US Air Force has a long history of "accidentally dropping a bomb" on someone who pissed them off. So sorry, tragic accident. While it's unlikely that either of the offended countries would ever by flying over Russian airspace, who knows where Yandex may have an office in the next 10 years.

Re:They were not secret

[Anonymous Coward]

What's your source on this "long history"?

Re:They were not secret

[mi]

And yet, they didn't reveal any of their own country's installations thus...

While I don't disagree with you regarding the positions being known already anyway, this action may still have been part of Putin's desperate bullying: "We know, where you are, ha-ha, let us rape Ukraine if you want peace".

Re:They were not secret

[Anonymous Coward]

True, Foreign military and terrorist organizations probably already knew where these were, but not the random lunatic determined to cause trouble. Rather than blur the spot they could have replace it with an "approved" satellite view of the area and, in this way, not give away the location.

Re:They were not secret

[Anonymous Coward]

Yea I don't get it, who are they hiding these bases from? Anyone that could make a significant attack has their own satellites and are well aware of the bases locations.

Re:They were not secret

[ripvlan]

correct. How secret were they that somebody could be tasked with blurring them out? "here comrade - make these spots disappear from map"

I remember that the US White House used to be blurred out (actually it was a white rectangle drawn over the roof). But Security Through Obscurity is a poor choice -- so they rebuilt the roof in order to hide their secrets from overhead cameras.

Obvious those that live near the base know about it. But it was those who use the internet that they are hiding from. "gee what are all these smudges all over the map?!"

Re:They were not secret

[Anonymous Coward]

Not to mention that if Yandex has the information in order to properly blur things, the information has already leaked to the entire universe.

Re:They were not secret

[Anonymous Coward]

If you as a map provider want to play it nice then you just replace items that are specific for that location with generic vehicles or generic trees copied from another part of the same area. Just keep the roads and buildings as is and nobody would be wiser.

Wouldn't that only work if every map maker follows the exact same replacement process?

Re:They were not secret

[Anonymous Coward]

I think that they should be directed to view H. M. Government File No. 42, How not to be seen.

Re:They were not secret

[Anonymous Coward]

Same with consumer drone GPS no fly lists.

Re:They were not secret

[Actually, I do RTFA]

Secret from whom?

Given that Russia is working hard on developing proxies in the Middle East, and given those proxies dislike both Israel and Turkey, it's possible that this was an easy (and deniable) way of publishing information to those proxies.

Re:They were not secret

[Anonymous Coward]

Surely the best policy is to place a large black rectangle over it with the words "Secret Military base" in red? This would avoid unpleasant accidents.

Who could imagine that spies know where secret locations are? Johnny English fans?

Answers on the back of a $10 note to me@here.com

Re:They were not secret

[Vanyle]

The funny thing is, Google is not blurring anything about this base, but Yandex is.

Here is the base on google maps: https://www.google.com/maps/se...

Re:They were not secret

[Anonymous Coward]

If a random lunatic poses a serious threat to your military bases than you have more pressing problems than the existence of this map.

Re:They were not secret

[AHuxley]

The design of the fence lines and troops on guard duty are the usual hint to all other advanced nations looking down.

Re:They were not secret

[Luckyo]

The secret can also be that the location is used for natsec purposes. Blurring out such location gives that fact out.

Re:They were not secret

[mapkinase]

You are right. I should have used the word "strategic"

Re:They were not secret

[mapkinase]

How difficult is actually to find these smudges?

I have never found a single smudge myself, only by reference

Re:They were not secret

[jrumney]

Indeed they have no obligation, and by revealing which bases the Russians' know about (if they weren't public knowledge, then they must have got the list of locations from somewhere), they may have shown their hand, or perhaps this is a bluff to misdirect foreign intelligence agencies.

Re:They were not secret

[DerekLyons]

No military installation in the world of the size of the large university campus is secret.

This isn't really about installations the size of large university campuses. It's also about installations the size of a city block (sometimes even within urban areas). It's about installations that aren't really visible from the road, and which weren't (until now) easily identifiable from the air as to owner and function. Etc... etc...
 

Stop posting idiotic articles.

To me it makes more sense for the idiots to stop posting idiotic comments on articles they have no clue about.

Re:They were not secret

[ripvlan]

In the case of the White House and GE Global Research -- they were obvious flat White rectangles that blotted out lawns and the building etc.. There were no features at all. While one couldn't see the rooftops it was obvious that something important was there.

As for the smudges - I haven't seen the ones referred to in the article. But I have seen others through time and they are mildly obvious. In this case I'll bet they were little ripples that somebody with Software could find. To our eye it probably wasn't all that obvious but to a computer program it was easy to find.

Re:They were not secret

[mapkinase]

Another feature is the absence of 3D. Try White House on Google Maps in 3D. The background highrises will be 3D and the whole Mall area is flat. Even the tall Washington Monument and prominent Lincoln Memorial.

Re:They were not secret

[ripvlan]

Wow. Even the Washington Post news building is available only in 2-D. :-P

secret to public?

[Anonymous Coward]

Cos i highly doubt any gov did not know about them

Please list the locations on Wikipedia/Leaks.

[Anonymous Coward]

If they're not secret, then nobody will mind.

Re:Please list the locations on Wikipedia/Leaks.

[Anonymous Coward]

Wikipedia will revert thm as not notable/unreliable source by an incel recent changes patroller.

Re: Please list the locations on Wikipedia/Leaks.

[Anonymous Coward]

Hey, Mr Assange, maybe you'd want to go on vacation? Wikipedia might want to use your special knack er talent in these places; get some air why not?

How secret were they?

[Dog-Cow]

I can't imagine any intelligence agency on the planet was ignorant of the same information that Yandex had to blur their maps.

Re:How secret were they?

[Anonymous Coward]

If the locations have been shared with a commercial mapping organisation they aren't secret.

Re:How secret were they?

[Anonymous Coward]

If the locations have been shared with a commercial mapping organisation they aren't secret.

OR... The imagery is actually from a "secret" source who has blurred the areas in question to "declassify" the pictures?

OSINT

[Anonymous Coward]

Open Source Intelligence Gathering is a thing, this is one method which I could imagine intel analysts get such info...

Re:OSINT

[Zocalo]

That's not the point. Take Incirlik; it's a nuclear bomber capable airbase (e.g. it's *big*) that frequently features in news reports during the wars in Iraq, Afghanistan and Syria, so there's no way that any foreign intel agencies/terrorists/interested third parties were not aware of it, what it is/was used for, what was stationed there, etc. regardless of whether they are reliant on OSInt or have their own satellites. Likewise the Israeli SAM/Ironshield sites; they pinpoint themselves everytime someone lobs rockets at Tel Aviv or wherever, so there's no way the PLO/Hamas/Iran/etc. don't already know where they are. Ditto the Whitehouse; terrorists locating 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue isn't the issue; it's having them find out where security check points, snipers, and other defenses are to help plan and facilitate an attack. Knowing the location is one thing, but knowing the detail is something else entirely. What makes this a clickbait story is that it makes it seem like the former that matters when it's really the latter that Yandex (and Google, Bing, and every other mapping agency that uses satellite imagery) are succesfully trying to obfuscate.

Re:OSINT

[Sique]

But Yandex, Bing, Google and everyone else blurring out the images means there are non-military, non-intelligence-agent people having access to the clear images they later blurr. So you don't know who else has access to those images.

And it means that there is less plausible deniability for the location and even some details of said facilities. Lets say there is some accident, and the victims of the accidents point to a military facility as the cause. Until now, the responsible government could simply say: There is no proof that there is any military facility nearby and thus refuse recompensation. Now people can point to the publicly available imagery and say: There is.

Re:OSINT

[Sique]

And there is even more to it. In the articles, they just point to facilities whose type and location is already well known, so they don't run afoul any legislation about revealing military secrets.

But you could actually go and explore the maps, and maybe you find that the block where the Mom&Pop Meat Processing Plant should be located, and it is also blurred out. So you start to wonder if behind the gates of the Mom&Pop Meat Processing Plant something else than meat gets processed.

Re:OSINT

[Archtech]

But Yandex, Bing, Google and everyone else blurring out the images means there are non-military, non-intelligence-agent people having access to the clear images they later blurr. So you don't know who else has access to those images.

Oh... my... God. So you mean that the taxpayers whose money bought all those ridiculously expensive weapons might learn where they are deployed? My, that is really awful.

And even foreigners!

Re:OSINT

[Zocalo]

Don't know if it's still the case, or how that might play out between jurisdictions, but I had to become SC to handle raw satellite imagery on the off-chance they might contain imagery of the type being blurred out here around 20 years ago. (We were leasing use of a former Soviet spy-sat to do large-scale ground surveys of Western Europe for agricultural applications. The resolution we were getting wasn't as good as today's publically accessible imagery, but the mono resolution was still high enough to get a feel for the size and shape of buildings, and I could tell my car was on my driveway when I pulled up the relevent image for a poster sized printout - and yes, I still have it.) If that is still the case, I'd assume that the satellite operators - e.g. DigitalGlobe for many of Google's images - have a team of SC cleared people that do the initial processing of raw images, then those images are passed on to customers like Google to use as they see fit.

Re:OSINT

[Anonymous Coward]

But Yandex, Bing, Google and everyone else blurring out the images means there are non-military, non-intelligence-agent people having access to the clear images they later blurr.

And, as soon as commercial satellites came into existence which had the imaging technology, this was inevitable.

When you're visible from orbit, it's hard to keep secrets, because you can't control what satellites fly overhead.

For plebes

[Anonymous Coward]

by plebes. This is why this is news!

Happy little accidents

[Anonymous Coward]

When Russia does something like that, it's rarely an accident.

Re:Happy little accidents

[Anonymous Coward]

When Russia does something like that, it's rarely an accident.

and if they didn't blur it out we'd be talking about that. fuck off.

Blurring Out is for the average people

[hcs_$reboot]

Browser exercise:

var a = ['US','Europe','Russia','China'];
a.forEach(function(b) {
a.forEach(function(c) {
console.log( b+' knows well '+c+' secret locations');
});
});

Re:Blurring Out is for the average people

[Anonymous Coward]

At the first iteration it told me that "US knows well US secret locations".
Not too sure about that.

Re:Blurring Out is for the average people

[Anonymous Coward]

Average people and less competent third-world countries and terrorists. I don't think they'd go after military bases, but infrastructure is not as well protected.

Streisand

[Calydor]

I suppose this is the Streisand effect of the cartography world.

Re:Streisand

[Tablizer]

I suppose this is the Streisand effect of the cartography world.

Rumor has it Streisand's house was also blurred out. Collusion!

Re:Streisand

[Calydor]

Don't you mean occlusion?

Re:Streisand

[Tablizer]

Is that a fat joke?

I'm sure the various military's already know this

[Anonymous Coward]

So now the public knows too.. so what?

The military IT team could just tell people

[Anonymous Coward]

Last week I was on a civilian international flight and there there were a bunch of American IT guys sitting behind me. They were on their way to work on a network in a US military base in a different country and chatting about their mission loudly enough that I could hear them clearly. They must have assumed that nobody on the plane spoke English, but by the end of the flight I knew all the details about their mission, the network infrastructure, their software software and even which types of ransomware they were having the most difficulty dealing with, not only in that base but in other bases they had been working at. As a software developer myself I couldn't believe how much these guys were disclosing in public.

In Soviet Russia...

[Anonymous Coward]

ICBM finds you!

Re:In Soviet Russia...

[Archtech]

ICBM finds you!

Actually, that should read "In continental USA... Russian ICBM finds YOU".

Especially if you are a member of the political elite who believes they can safely start wars in faraway places and never suffer the consequences themselves.

Use Walmart

[Dan East]

Instead of blurring they should just stamp down a Walmart and its parking lot, plus maybe a Dollar Tree plaza along with it. They can just scale the whole thing as needed - it's not like most people have any idea what they are looking at anyway. :)

Re:Use Walmart

[bluegutang]

I saw one country's map where they copy/pasted parks over all the military institutions. You would see it and then think "Wait a second, if there's a park there why have I never seen or visited it?" and walk away a bit confused.

Re:Use Walmart

[Anonymous Coward]

> "Wait a second, if there's a park there why have I never seen or visited it?" and walk away a bit confused.

Or people keep showing up for hikes and picnics and get turned away.

Re:Use Walmart

[PPH]

Paste empty clearings in the forest with some logging equipment parked. Maybe a few piles of cut trees.

They use this for some of the wealthy people's vacation homes and hunting lodges in closed (purportedly a watershed) public area near where I live. The area access is secured with CCTV and automated gates. These aren't unimproved logging/maintenance roads. They are very nicely maintained and, if you are nearby at the right time, you can see the occasional Mercedes or BMW coming or going. But Google maps shows nothing other than logging roads and large, stump-covered clearings in the woods.

Re:Use Walmart

[Areyoukiddingme]

They use this for some of the wealthy people's vacation homes and hunting lodges in closed (purportedly a watershed) public area near where I live.

"closed" "public area". Wat? What's that? 'cause it sounds illegal.

Re:Use Walmart

[Pfhorrest]

Public as in not owned by any private individual (but rather by a government), closed as in set aside not to be used for anything. If it is a watershed, like he says it purportedly is, then it's a big open field somewhere meant to collect rainwater, that then goes into the municipal water supply, which is set aside from use for the sake of water quality. Aside from watersheds, there are also nature preserves and so on (e.g. a habitat for an endangered species) where the land is public (government owned) but closed to human use.

Re:Use Walmart

[Anonymous Coward]

Area 51. Live fire range at JBLM. Just a few examples.

Re:Use Walmart

[Wolfrider]

--Dude, you don't really want people showing up at the front door of your secret military facility looking for cheap goods and sales at the "new store"...

Re: Use Walmart

[Anonymous Coward]

This is pretty much what they do in my country. I was out bushwalking, the terrain was much tougher than I was expecting, so I was pretty pleased to find an old bitumen road that ran a nice easy way out of the valley. When I got back to civilization, I was surprised to find a super solid steel gate and rail fence, and a sign along the lines of 'private road, no access etc'.

When I got home, had a look on gmaps. The road wasnt an auto-detected road in the street maps, but clearly visible on sat. It lead eventually to a ~2km square block of super low res bush, taken in winter, but for 20 km in any direction, the photos are summer and quite good res. Veeery suspicious. Really must get back there one day better equipped and see whats going on...

Re:Use Walmart

[Anonymous Coward]

Instead of blurring they should just stamp down a Walmart and its parking lot, plus maybe a Dollar Tree plaza along with it. They can just scale the whole thing as needed - it's not like most people have any idea what they are looking at anyway. :)

How about just admitting that any serious adversary already has access to this information and stop making people keep secrets just because.

Re:Use Walmart

[Areyoukiddingme]

Aside from watersheds, there are also nature preserves and so on (e.g. a habitat for an endangered species) where the land is public (government owned) but closed to human use.

Closed to human use except for those humans who drive Mercedes and BMWs?

It's sounding like this purported watershed... isn't. The whole thing is a scam to hide rich people's houses, from the tampering in Google Maps to the alleged designation as a protected watershed.

Is it just me, or are the assholes starting to realize they're fucking the general population over just a little bit TOO hard if they think they have to resort to measures like this to hide where they live?

Re:Use Walmart

[Pfhorrest]

If the shenanigans PPH describes are going on then yeah, that's bad and probably technically illegal (though obviously being done with government assistance, so...).

I was just commenting that the concept of a closed public space is not in itself a weird thing to say.

Re:Use Walmart

[flink]

--Dude, you don't really want people showing up at the front door of your secret military facility looking for cheap goods and sales at the "new store"...

I think the barbed wire, "Last Exit Before Checkpoint" signs, barricades, and the whir of an autocannon spinning up might clue them in.

Straight from the Wizard of Oz

[Anonymous Coward]

Pay no attention to the installation shown by the iron curtain, or equally follow the yellow bricked image!

Secrecy isn't binary

[cmseagle]

There's a difference between "foreign intelligence services know where your military base is" and "every wahoo with an internet connection knows where your military base is." Secrecy comes in degrees.

Re:Secrecy isn't binary

[Anonymous Coward]

LOL @ your secrets. In a few years there'll be a constellation of powerful and small citizen satellites in orbit. Every "wahoo" will be able to watch full spectrum, high resolution imagery of everything, from radio to gamma, like they watch local aircraft, pollution and weather data today.

Re:Secrecy isn't binary

[Anonymous Coward]

Not really. The military has ways of dealing with a "wahoo" who thinks he can mess with a military base. (Throw rocks? Fly a civilian drone over it? Protest at the gate?)

If an attack comes, it will be an organized military force, who have done their best to figure out the bases in advance. At best, map blurring will keep some secrets from lands who don't have their own satellites, and who needs better than civilian/commercial satellite photos.

Re:Secrecy isn't binary

[Anonymous Coward]

Small satellites can't take high resolution images from orbit. You need large optics for that

Re:Secrecy isn't binary

[nospam007]

"There's a difference between "foreign intelligence services know where your military base is" and "every wahoo with an internet connection knows where your military base is."

So if foreign secret service know it bit's OK but if Bubba from Idaho knows it it's a problem?

"Secrecy comes in degrees."

Stupidity too.

Re:Secrecy isn't binary

[mapkinase]

"every wahoo with an internet connection knows where your military base is."

And the danger is?

This wouldn't have happened in Soviet Russia...

[Anonymous Coward]

in Soviet Russia, secret military bases obscure you!

A good maxim

[Anonymous Coward]

If you would know what truths a man has, find what he has to hide.

Re:The military IT team could just tell people

[Archtech]

They must have assumed that nobody on the plane spoke English.

That's always a safe bet anywhere in the world nowadays. Especially on airliners. After all, English is just a hole-in-corner minority language of no interest to most people.

Zoom! Enhance! ENHANCE!

[Anonymous Coward]

(but in ruskie)

Secret for whom?

[rkordmaa]

If a mapping service knows that a site is of "secret" nature, then so does everyone who's actual job is to know such things in foreign countries. All this blurring does is prevent general public from peeking in, it does squat against state players.

Re:Secret for whom?

[Anonymous Coward]

This is exactly the point. Domestic terrorism is a much bigger concern than international espionage.

But that's been true since the fall of the Bastille.....

Re:Secret for whom?

[PPH]

Domestic terrorism is a much bigger concern

Domestic terrorism is directed at 'soft' targets (usually civilian). The few strikes against military bases have been by insiders. Who already know where the bases are and what is inside them.

It is not about you

[Anonymous Coward]

That only confirms that the main threat is terrorism, but not the guy looking with telescope from space. :-)
On other hand you have job now to confirm those locations. The only problem is how fast you confirm and how frequently Yandex exposes new locations in its service.

Re: The military IT team could just tell people

[Anonymous Coward]

It wasn't a safe bet, because there was someone on the plane who not only understood their language, but also understood the technical details of what they were leaking. They should probably be fired for gross misconduct.

Waze shortcut

[jfdavis668]

Since they are blurred out, Waze will now direct people through them as shortcuts around traffic jams.

Re: The military IT team could just tell people

[dunkelfalke]

I think that deserves a whooooosh.

Symington amendment

[RandySC]

If Israel has nuclear facilities and refuse to sign non-proliferation treaties, then it is a violation of federal law to send them foreign aid.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
The Foreign Assistance Act of 1961 was amended by the Symington Amendment (Section 669 of the FAA) in 1976. It banned U.S. economic, and military assistance, and export credits to countries that deliver or receive, acquire or transfer nuclear enrichment technology when they do not comply with IAEA regulations and inspections. This provision, as amended, is now contained in Section 101 of the Arms Export Control Act (AECA).

The Glenn Amendment (Section 670) was later adopted in 1977, and provided the same sanctions against countries that acquire or transfer nuclear reprocessing technology or explode or transfer a nuclear device. This provision, as amended, is now contained in Section 102 of the Arms Export Control Act (AECA).

French Embassy

[sjbe]

What's your source on this "long history"?

Well I can think of one example. In 1986 the US bombed Libya. One building that was hit was the French Embassy in Tripoli. The French had refused to allow US bombers to traverse their airspace from bases in England that forced the US planes to fly an additional 2600 nautical miles around France to get to Libya. It was understood/suspected right at the time that this was an "accident" with plausible deniability.

Re:French Embassy

[lgw]

That's the best example in recent times. There were some shenanigans in our recent tangle with Russia over Syria, though I'm not sure an actual bomb was ever involved. There were of course hundreds of "accidents" during Vietnam. Dropping an "improvised incendiary device" on a village they didn't like happened a lot.

Re:French Embassy

[jrumney]

Or in Iraq, where missiles kept hitting Reuters and Al Jazeera buildings - the only two news agencies that weren't under "protection" of the US military so they could control what news was reported.

Re:French Embassy

[Anonymous Coward]

hundreds of "accidents" during Vietnam. Dropping an "improvised incendiary device" on a village they didn't like happened a lot.

Isn't that kind of what you're supposed to do to the enemy when you're in a war though?

Re:French Embassy

[someoneOtherThanMe]

Didn't they also hit the Chinese embassy during NATO bombings of Belgrade in 1999?

From the big-blurry-blocks dept.

[DontBeAMoran]

So they partnered with Japan for the blurring technology?

Do it smart...

[Anonymous Coward]

Replace all of Russia's secret parts with Tits and giant Pink Dildo's.

Re: The military IT team could just tell people

[PPH]

They should probably be fired for gross misconduct.

Like that's ever going to happen.

I have a friend who used to run a photo processing lab (when film was still a thing). One of his techs told him to come and take a look at one of the rolls coming off their machine. Pictures of the family and kids on the front lawn, with license plates and house number visible. And then pictures of the control room of a modern submarine. Having served in military intelligence (back in Vietnam), he knew this was a no-no. So he called the FBI, who came and took the film,saying that they would 'take care' of the problem. Nothing ever happened to the person (an exec at a local defense contractor) but he lost all the photo business (unclassified) from them and a few other DoD contractors.

The DoD isn't going to lean on the big shots in private industry. Or the next war they fight, they will have to do so with sharpened sticks.

It's happened before

[cellocgw]

I remember buying the USGS 15-minute (that's distance, not time) series of maps around Durham, NH when I lived there in the 60s. Because Pease Airbase was a military base at that time, no buildings or elevation information was allowed to be plotted on the map. However, it apparently was ok to plot vegetation (green) vs. non-vegetation (off-white, applies to roads, buildings, etc) over the whole airbase. Didn't take a genius to find the airstrips, the main control buildings, the family housing developments on-base, etc.

interesting

[renegade600]

If the mapping company blurred out secret bases, how did they know those bases were there if they were a secret???

Re:interesting

[Krishnoid]

Because all of them are belonged to, er, them.

Re:interesting

[AHuxley]

Re "bases were there if they were a secret"
Thats the easy part when trying to map and sell maps. Governments allow what was once "spy" maps to be created by anyone who can afford such collection methods from space.
But for that global collection ability the gov/mil still has some power to regulate.

The gov buys an image of a part of the world first and says its not be published. No extra/new copy of that data set/map/image can be sold.
The media can ask to "buy" an image of a base but will be told that data set at that location has been sold and cant be sold again.
A commercial arrangement thats not legal "censorship" but no more data about locations will exist to buy.
Thats how almost all mapping company workers know a site is interesting. The data only has one "buyer", a gov and it can never be sold again.
Gov has the first right of refusal to buy and own when first letting such space collection get approved ie the gov ensured "shutter control" past a set resolution.

Here's an idea!

[Anonymous Coward]

If you blow up all the military bases there won't be any more war.

Anybody here like the idea of having peace for once?

Fitbit

[Anonymous Coward]

Fitbit has already located all military installations.

Accidently?

[Anonymous Coward]

Isn't it possible Russia wanted these sites exposed? They're allies with Iran who probably wouldn't mind if Hamas knew exactly where to aim their rockets?

#NextTimeThinkBeforeYouVote

[Anonymous Coward]

LOL!!!!! Good one!!

What's Hillary Got to do With the KKK?

[Anonymous Coward]

You do realize the KKK is an alt RIGHT organization, headed up by their Grand Wizard Donald Trump, don't you? He's the one that's got them all tweaked about building a wall to keep brown people out.

You #MAGAtards seem to keep bringing Hillary's name up. Why are you so stuck on her? She lost. Get over it already.