(Minghui.org) The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has been eavesdropping on Falun Dafa practitioners' phone calls since before the persecution began in 1999. Back then, monitoring was manually controlled. Someone could spy on an area for a whole day listening to the phones, but it was difficult to monitor a large group of people.

When texting became popular, monitoring became easier. And since accessing the internet with smart phones became widespread, the content that the CCP monitored, and their monitoring capabilities, increased exponentially. For example, the CCP is collecting information on:

• The mobile phone user's location and travel routes.• All the information input into applications, calls and text messages. All conversations and background voices can be converted into text.• Pictures taken with phones – people in pictures can be identified through facial recognition software. The CCP can hack into the cameras and take additional pictures and videos.• Fingerprints from the “unlock with fingerprint function.”• Voice-prints – everyone has different biological sound features, just like fingerprints.• Payment information – showing shopping habits, income and employment details.• Chatting information – providing a sketch of a person's thought process.• Mobile phone browser and applications. This makes hacking and data collection easier.• What websites, IP addresses and services you access.• Contact information from address books.• Health and lifestyle information.
Due to control and pressure from the CCP, mobile phone and internet companies collect the above information and give it to the Party. People in China have little privacy. All the more so for mobile phone users, especially those whom the CCP is interested in.

The recent rise of artificial intelligence technology has enabled the CCP to fully utilize all this data. Never before in history has a regime had such a monitoring ability, but now the CCP has it.

A typical scenario: A practitioner is chatting (not on their phone) and happens to mention a “trigger word.” The mobile phone activates, and begins to use the voice recognition function to record and upload all conversations.

From then on, this mobile phone is set for long-term monitoring, using the various aforementioned monitoring methods. Through the phone’s address book, call recording and chat software, the CCP then locates other practitioners to monitor.

The keyword wake-up function is part of most newer mobile phones. For reference, please see the “Hi Siri” function of the Apple system and the “Hi Google” function of the Android mobile phone. The CCP has made sure that phones in China have multiple wake-up words and phrases.

Anyone who buys a cell phone in China is buying a device that enables the CCP to spy on him or her. The phone comes with spying software that was installed at the factory. Thus, restoring the factory settings cannot solve the problem.