Canadian coins may be tracking you
Canadian quarters and nickels are legendary for finding their way into American pockets. Even thousands of miles away from the northern border, they sneak their way into the vending machines and laundry machines of unsuspecting Yankees. The coins may be doing more than simply getting in the way, however. It turns out they could be ...
Canadian quarters and nickels are legendary for finding their way into American pockets. Even thousands of miles away from the northern border, they sneak their way into the vending machines and laundry machines of unsuspecting Yankees.
Canadian quarters and nickels are legendary for finding their way into American pockets. Even thousands of miles away from the northern border, they sneak their way into the vending machines and laundry machines of unsuspecting Yankees.
The coins may be doing more than simply getting in the way, however. It turns out they could be tracking you:
In a U.S. government warning high on the creepiness scale, the Defense Department cautioned its American contractors over what it described as a new espionage threat: Canadian coins with tiny radio frequency transmitters hidden inside.
The government said the mysterious coins were found planted on U.S. contractors with classified security clearances on at least three separate occasions between October 2005 and January 2006 as the contractors traveled through Canada.
It’s unlikely the Canadians were the ones doing the listening, as U.S. intelligence agencies already work extremely closely with them. Instead, other governments may have been trying to exploit the large size and unfamiliar weight (to Americans) of the coins to hide the tracking devices.
Worse, the coin trick is just one of many warned about in the report:
The government’s 29-page report was filled with other espionage warnings. It described unrelated hacker attacks, eavesdropping with miniature pen recorders and the case of a female foreign spy who seduced her American boyfriend to steal his computer passwords.
In another case, a film processing company called the FBI after it developed pictures for a contractor that contained classified images of U.S. satellites and their blueprints. The photo was taken from an adjoining office window.
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