San Francisco, May 23: US President Donald Trump has resisted installing security features on his phone designed to shield his communications because he thinks they are "too inconvenient" -- making his cellphone potentially vulnerable to hacking.
According to two senior administration officials, the President, who relies on cellphones to reach his friends and millions of Twitter followers, has rebuffed staff efforts to strengthen security around his phone use, Politico reported.
"Trump uses at least two iPhones. The phones -- one capable only of making calls, the other equipped only with the Twitter app and preloaded with a handful of news sites -- are issued by White House Information Technology and the White House Communications Agency, an office staffed by military personnel that oversees White House telecommunications," an official was quoted as saying.
The official added that Trump has resisted to his aides' advice to swap out the Twitter phone on a monthly basis and he has gone as long as five months without having the phone checked by security experts.
His predecessor Barack Obama handed over his White House phones every 30 days to be examined for hacking and other suspicious activity.
A senior West Wing official said the Trump's call-capable phones "are seamlessly swapped out on a regular basis through routine support operations. Because of the security controls of the Twitter phone and the Twitter account, it does not necessitate regular change-out".
Trump's call-capable cellphone has a camera and microphone that put the device at a risk of being hacked and cyber criminals could use them to access the phone and monitor the President's movements.
The GPS location tracker, however, is disabled on Trump's devices, the report said.
The West Wing official also said that "due to inherent capabilities and advancement in technologies, these devices are more secure than any Obama-era devices".
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Belagavi: Medical Education Minister Dr. Sharanaparakash Rudrappa Patil on Tuesday said the State government plans to establish day-care chemotherapy centres in all district hospitals across Karnataka to make cancer treatment more accessible.
Replying to a question raised by BJP MLC M.P. Kushalappa during the Question Hour in the Legislative Council, the minister said it was not feasible for cancer patients from various districts to travel repeatedly to Kidwai Memorial Institute in Bengaluru. To address this issue, the government is taking steps to establish cancer care centers in other districts in collaboration with the Kidwai Memorial Institute of Oncology.
Providing details of cancer treatment at Kidwai, Dr. Patil said that over the past three years, 41,512 cancer patients have received treatment at the institute. Treatment included surgery, radiation therapy, chemotherapy, or a combination of these, depending on the type and stage of cancer.
Between 2022 and 2024, a total of 12,781 patients underwent surgery, 14,423 patients received radiation therapy, and over 28,370 patients were administered chemotherapy, he said.
The minister further noted that more than 110 patients were provided bone marrow transplants, an otherwise expensive procedure, free of cost at the institute during the same period.
The proposed day-care chemotherapy centers, he said, would significantly reduce the burden on patients and improve access to timely cancer treatment at the district level.
