Running Into Open Secrets: How to Investigate Using the Strava Fitness App

US social media app for fitness enthusiasts, Strava , boasts over 135 million users in more than 190 countries.

Recent investigations reveal how use of the app by people who should be keeping a lower public profile have left them, and even top secret institutions, vulnerable.

Israel ’s Mystery Runner purportedly took 60 long runs in four days in an incredibly very short timeruns on 30 Israeli military bases.

Israeli officials were troubled in October 2024 , when Omer Benjakob , disinformation and cyber reporter for Haaretz , sent them a query about a suspicious user who claimed to be from Texas .

Le Monde’s #StravaLeaks investigative series revealed how Strava can be used to predict movements of French President Emmanuel Macron and Russian President Vladimir Putin .

The pair used a deceptively simple method: if you log a fake run in a specific place, StravA will reveal who also runs there.

The reporters used a Python tool developed by Antoine Schirer to map all the locations where security officers were running.

Le Monde's # StravaLeaks methodology was still operational during more recent reporting efforts.

Bourdon and Schirer shared tips with GIJN for journalists that want to do their own open source investigations.

Using Python, map all the activities of a profile you find interesting.