Belarus government official accuses Pokémon GO of being used to gather intelligence information

Alexander Ivanov, a leader in the Ministry of Defense of Belarus, has recently suggested that Pokémon GO may have been used to gather military information during the height of its popularity in 2016. While discussing national security on the Belarusian talk show “Po Suschestvu,” Ivanov shared his suspicions that Pokémon GO was deliberately spawning Pokémon near the Machulishchy air base near Minsk, the country’s capital.

Alexander Ivanov, Head of the Department of the Main Directorate of Ideological Work of the Ministry of Defense of Belarus, says:
All teenagers, children were sitting on some application, you turn on the camera, augmented reality, and look for some rare Pokemon, collect them in a collection. Where did you see the most Pokémon, when you think about it? On the territory of the 50th air base, where there is a runway, where there are a lot of military aircraft, there were the most Pokémon. Is this not intelligence information?

Ivanov specifically mentioned the augmented reality aspect of the game, suggesting that a phone’s camera could be used to collect images of military aviation equipment. Though Ivanov did not name which countries he suspected of benefitting from Pokémon GO’s alleged espionage, he did also seem to suggest that the popularity of anime as a whole could be related to national security. Niantic, Pokémon GO’s San Francisco-based developer, has denied accusations of spying on intelligence information from countries across the globe since very early in the game’s lifespan.