Senator says governments spying through push notifications, Reuters reports

In a letter to the Department of Justice, Senator Ron Wyden said unidentified governments are surveilling smartphone users through push notifications, Raphael Satter of Reuters reports. Wyden said foreign officials were demanding the data from Google (GOOG;GOOGL) and Apple (AAPL), since push notification alerts travel over these companies’ servers. While this gives the companies insight into traffic flowing to certain apps, it also puts them in a “unique position to facilitate government surveillance of how users are using particular apps,” Wyden said.