A 35-minute training session, carelessly posted on Strava, was enough to reveal the position of the aircraft carrier Charles de Gaulle, one of the crown jewels of the French Army. It is in the middle of the eastern Mediterranean Sea, a European friend, in the middle of the new war in the Middle East.
This incident, which occurred on March 13 and was revealed yesterday by the newspaper highlights a known vulnerability: the use of civilian physical activity tracking applications by military personnel can turn a seemingly harmless activity into a strategic weakness. It’s a sum and goes.
According to the leading newspaper in the neighboring country, on March 13, at 10:35 in the morning, among the waves, a young officer of the French Navy went out for a run, circling around the deck of the ship where he works. To record his journey – just over seven kilometers in 35 minutes – he used the smart watch he wore on his wrist. The collected data was uploaded to the internet in a second.
The soldier has a profile on the Strava sports application, which is public, that anyone can see. Therefore, with a simple gesture, it has just reported, almost live, the exact position in the Mediterranean Sea of the aircraft carrier Charles de Gaulle and its escort, northwest of Cyprus and about one hundred kilometers from the Turkish coast.
The presence in the region of the French naval force, made up of at least three frigates and a supply ship, in addition to the aircraft carrier, is no secret. On March 3, the president himself announced that he had ordered their deployment, a few days after the start of the war between Israel, the United States and Iran.
The only French aircraft carrier was then in the Baltic Sea participating in NATO exercises and planned to remain there until May. Its transit through the Strait of Gibraltar was announced on March 6.
However, transmitting the exact position of the naval force, almost in real time and publicly, onlineconstitutes a dangerous act of recklessness in the context of the war in . This is especially true given that, in recent weeks, at least two French military bases in the region have been attacked by Iran. A French soldier was killed and six others were injured in northern Iraq after a drone attack.
Strava, the key
Through the Strava account of the soldier, whom the newspaper calls Arthuranyone can follow the movements of the Charles de Gaulle and its escort ships. On February 14, a localized activity at sea placed the sailor off the Cotentin peninsula, 40 kilometers from Cherbourg. On February 26 and 27, he was on the ground in Copenhagen, according to his Strava data. A short trip to the Danish capital while the aircraft carrier was docked in Malmö, Sweden, across the strait. And on March 13, the young man was northwest of Cyprus. This information could be corroborated a few days later when satellite images of this area of the eastern Mediterranean became available.
In this satellite image, taken just over an hour after Arthur’s race, the silhouette of the 262-meter-long French aircraft carrier can be clearly seen. It appears as loops in the water, probably because the sailor was running on a moving ship. This race took place approximately six kilometers from where the boat was later photographed.
Two reasons could explain this discrepancy: either Arthur was running aboard the aircraft carrier, which was still moving, or the young man was then on board one of the ships escorting the aircraft carrier. In any case, it was the public dissemination of Arthur’s sporting activities that allowed The World locate the Charles de Gaulle.
When contacted, the General Staff of the French Armed Forces stated that publishing this race route on the Strava application “does not comply with current regulations,” of which “sailors are regularly informed.” Since “digital hygiene for combatants” is a “prerequisite for any deployment,” the General Staff assured that “the command will take the appropriate measures.”
Arthur is not the only sailor who The World could identify on Strava. On board a French Navy ship participating in a mission in recent days, at least one other public profile posted photos of its sporting activities, revealing the ship’s location. Other public profiles also show photos of the deck, of other soldiers and of the sports equipment inside the ships.
Add and continue
It’s not a thing for today. Already in the fall of 2024, he – everything is clear from the name – documented security flaws related to the use of the fitness application by the bodyguards of the French, American and Russian presidents. It was not only possible to identify the agents and their associates, but also to track them and therefore anticipate some of the movements of the heads of state.
But it’s not just a France thing either. A similar case has already occurred with the United States as victim. The same application revealed the location of secret US army bases through the use of its uniformed personnel. “In Syria, the known bases of the coalition (that is, the US) illuminate the night,” read the reports at the time.
