President Donald Trump is pursuing a media environment centered on White House control while his administration’s official phone app seeks extensive access to users’ data. The combination is propaganda with a surveillance flavored bonus, served with the usual Trump vanity.

The latest stage of Trump’s assault on the media began when he banned CNN, MS NOW, and Politico from the White House. In response, video pool outlets refused to provide video coverage of Trump’s visit with Chinese President Xi Jinping.

That brief display of media solidarity already appears to be fading, even though CNN remains excluded from the video pool. The White House, meanwhile, is promoting a more controlled alternative that delivers Trump directly to the public without independent journalists in the way.

The administration’s approach treats news organizations as unnecessary gatekeepers between Trump and the country. Under that sales pitch, the only version of events anyone supposedly needs is the one coming directly from Trump himself.

The White House already has Trump TV, a YouTube propaganda channel devoted exclusively to showing clips of Trump around the clock. Now the administration wants a more intimate position inside users’ phones through its official app, which also offers access to Trump TV.

“The American people are not waiting on those cameras; they are going straight to the Presidency,” the White House said in its press release announcing the app. That framing turns independent coverage into an obstacle and direct presidential messaging into the preferred destination.

Going directly to the presidency, however, carries a steep privacy cost. Installing and using the White House app means surrendering large amounts of personal data to an administration that has offered plenty of reasons for caution.

“It’s asking for your location data in real time. It also asks for personal information to access your financial data, to access your messages, to access all kinds of information,” former Apple App Store developer and senior platform engineer Joseph Gera said.

Giving any government that degree of access to personal information would be alarming. Giving it to this White House, while it is simultaneously trying to sideline independent media and elevate its own propaganda, makes the proposition even more grotesque.

The app has been around for months, and the administration previously demanded that it be installed on all government employee phones. The White House claimed it would “provide value to government employees’ day-to-day work.”

That promised value apparently includes a steady pipeline of Trump content for federal employees. The app also features a button allowing users to text Trump, opening a message to a selected number with the default text “Greatest President Ever!”

The naked flattery would be ridiculous enough by itself, but the app also presents serious security concerns. It shares users’ IP addresses and time zones with third party services, including a Russian widget service called Elfsight.

The app initially launched with GPS tracking. Although that tracking appears to have been reduced somewhat, the app still monitors a user’s location several times every minute.

The Washington Sun also reported that the app contains a keylogger script that was “sourced online from an amateur developer based in India.” Keyloggers can have benign purposes, but they are also commonly found in surveillance malware.

That leaves the government relying on code gathered from the internet while asking users to trust it with messages, financial data, personal information, and repeated location monitoring. Nothing about that arrangement exactly screams careful vetting or responsible security.

The result closely resembles the media landscape Trump appears to want: White House control, endless declarations of his greatness, reduced access for independent journalists, and an official app capable of monitoring users. It is state propaganda for the phone age, complete with tracking built into the package.