House Republicans just sent inquiries to two tech giants about law enforcement tracking tools embedded in their app ecosystems. The focus? How much access authorities actually have to user location data through mobile applications.

This isn't just a Big Tech problem anymore. It's a wake-up call for anyone who thinks their phone is private. While centralized platforms dance around compliance questions, the crypto space has been screaming about surveillance risks for years.

Think about it: your average app can ping your location dozens of times per day. Law enforcement taps into that goldmine with varying degrees of oversight. Meanwhile, decentralized alternatives are building privacy-first infrastructure that doesn't even collect this data to begin with.

The irony? Regulators grill these companies about tracking, but the real solution might already exist in Web3 protocols designed to eliminate centralized data honeypots entirely. Sometimes the best way to protect user privacy isn't better policies—it's better architecture.