Millions of Pokémon Go players spent years scanning real-world locations for in-game rewards, unaware their data would later help train artificial intelligence (AI) tied to military drone navigation systems.
Since 2021, the game has encouraged users to capture photos or videos of real-world landmarks through its PokéStop Scan augmented reality (AR) feature.
Those uploads have since grown into roughly 30 billion scans, which were fed into a large database later used by Niantic’s spin-off, Niantic Spatial, to develop a 3D mapping system, according to an investigation by Dutch media outlet Trouw.
The imaging solution powers a visual positioning system (VPS) that allows drones to navigate without GPS — a critical capability in modern combat zones where signals are disrupted or jammed.
The tech is now part of a partnership with defense software firm Vantor in Colorado, which secured a US Army contract worth up to $217 million last February.
Players as Product
The companies clarified that raw user data was not shared directly. Instead, the scans were used to train foundational AI models supporting the 3D mapping system.
“AR scans… were submitted voluntarily by players who opted in,” a Niantic Spatial spokesperson told The Guardian.
Still, analysts warn that the implications are significant.
“Most people don’t read vast legal documents when they want to play a video game,” said Tom Sulston of Australia-based tech policy organization Digital Rights Watch. “‘Free’ software services often treat the user … as the product to be sold.”
Jeroen van den Hoven, an ethics professor at the Netherlands’ Delft University of Technology, added that the scans helped the tactical charting capability to mature rapidly.
“The people who thought they were playing a game have clearly been fooled,” van den Hoven told Trouw.
“It is gradually starting to sink in that companies are not necessarily using our data to truly advance our lives. It is about making money. If they can sell a dataset or AI model for a good price, they will do so.”
