Apple Wants To Share Your Location With Others 248
Posted
by
kdawson
from the leaving-more-than-virtual-tracks dept.
from the leaving-more-than-virtual-tracks dept.
Farhood sends in this snip from the LA Times: "In an updated version of its privacy policy, the company added a paragraph noting that once users agree, Apple and unspecified 'partners and licensees' may collect and store user location data. When users attempt to download apps or media from the iTunes store, they are prompted to agree to the new terms and conditions. Until they agree, they cannot download anything through the store. The company says the data is anonymous and does not personally identify users. Analysts have shown, however, that large, specific data sets can be used to identify people based on behavior patterns." Mashable and The Consumerist have picked up on this collection and sharing of "precise location data, including the real-time geographic location of your Apple computer or device."
Beh (Score:5, Insightful)
s/share/sell/
s/with/to/
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That's the opt-out page for targeted iAds. What does it have to do with this story?
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The location data collection is part of the iAds framework.
You can also just turn off location services, or control what apps can use it. Whether this will affect what the core OS does is another matter.
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The TOS definitely talks about these features totally separately: the Opt-out service is described like this "If you do not want to receive ads with this level of relevance on your mobile device, you can opt out...". It doesn't say you won't be tracked...
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And one of their licensees just happens to be the FBI.
Isn't this exactly what we lambaste Google for? (Score:5, Insightful)
Well not quite, Google does not explicitly state they are planning on selling your data.
Does anyone still wonder why it is bad to be beholden to a single supply chain?
So Apple does not want you to have freedom or respects your privacy.
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It's not necessarily the same thing that google does.
When you install an app that uses location data then the app almost certainly already knows exactly who you are, no inferences needed. So the question is not if apps are accessing your location data but if apple is downloading it to the mothership and selling this to third parties whose apps you did not purchase. However there that daya may or may not be processed before handing over. For example, if they hand over a string of locations and times you
private bits (Score:2)
IU was just thinking that you could even quantitate the degree of information being handed over and it's likelihood it identifies you. Some measure like the entropy or the mutual information of the data set correlation might quantify the uniquness. That is how many bits in uncertainty would there be on a user ID. Companies could even Publish this in their privacy statements. e.g. apple might say they rank a 11 privacy bits, meaning that the average user is idenitifed to only one pool of 2048 individual
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How about a histogram of when you and your SO are NOT at home. A little burglary anyone?
Thank you, Apple (Score:2)
One more reason to keep my money in my pocket. Otherwise when another carrier besides the hated AT&T gets iPhones, I'd have been tempted to buy one. Not now. Apple makes some cool shit, but until they start respecting their customers I'll never be one.
WTF? (Score:3, Informative)
Call me naive, but I trust Apple. I've been using Mobile Me since late 2004. I just migrated away from the Palm phone after three years; I now have an iPhone as my primary phone. My calendar, my contacts, etc. are in the Apple cloud. And guess what? They've never done ANYTHING to erode my trust in them. In the age of telecom companies trying to cap mobile data plans, and place arbitrary restrictions on IP-delivered media content, Apple is busy trying to roll out fiber and generally make the Internet better. I believe that not only do they live by their "think different" mantra, but that they realize the days of the free Internet may be numbered. They're doing their best to save the Internet as we know it. Granted, they have something to gain. But other companies' failure to evolve leaves the door wide open for a company which we should trust far more than AT&T, Time Warner, etc. to preserve the landscape that slashdotters are so eager to protect. The tag is correct, it's a witch hunt. Apple admitted their mistake, we move on.
deja vu [slashdot.org] ! Spooky!
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Re:Isn't this exactly what we lambaste Google for? (Score:5, Insightful)
Naive. :)
A very good friend once told me: "If you put your balls in their hands, don't complain if they decide to squeeze them". That was almost ten years ago, and he was referring to Microsoft, but see how it fits perfectly with a lot of companies, including Apple.
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Yeah... I think I'm going to go ahead and blame apple anyway.
Hmmm, another copy/paste troll. (Score:2)
As the warning says when I accidentally double post, "try to be more original".
At least they tell you.. (Score:2, Interesting)
What the update means is that they've relaxed the application vetting so apps that use the geolocation API aren't scrutinised as much as they used to be. Apple are telling users that apps can, and will, collect and store your location data, and that they're not going to stop them even if there's no reason for the app to be doing it. The app will still ask you if you want to share your location as it always has done.
Who tells you that might be happening if you have an Android phone? Or if you install a brows
Re:At least they tell you.. (Score:5, Insightful)
It's different from Google like this: Quoting Cory Doctorow: "This is different from Android, in that Google does not gather your information unless you opt in, and if you do opt in, you can opt out later.
"By contrast, Apple gathers your information without asking you to opt in, and does not present you with the option of opting out.
"What's more, Apple is presenting these new terms retrospectively. People who bought iPads and iPods on the understanding that they could be used without having their location information gathered and shared now find that they *must* allow this information to be gathered and shared (I suppose you could try not updating iTunes, but then you would also have to not upgrade your OS -- OS upgrades come with iTunes upgrades -- and be prepared to be locked out of the app store, and since Apple's use of DRM prevents third parties from putting apps on your devices, you're fundamentally abandoning any hope of loading any code, even third-party code, onto your iPad and iPod)."
Of course, he may or may not be correct.
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People who bought iPads and iPods on the understanding that they could be used without having their location information gathered and shared now find that they *must* allow this information to be gathered and shared (I suppose you could try not updating iTunes, but then you would also have to not upgrade your OS -- OS upgrades come with iTunes upgrades -- and be prepared to be locked out of the app store, and since Apple's use of DRM prevents third parties from putting apps on your devices, you're fundamentally abandoning any hope of loading any code, even third-party code, onto your iPad and iPod).
Sounds like a class action lawsuit waiting to happen.
Re:At least they tell you.. (Score:5, Insightful)
Read the parent that you're responding to! His point is that Apple is applying these terms to people AFTER they have bought the phone. It's an automatic opt-in unless you want to go to a lot of effort to sit outside Apple's walled garden, at which point you lose a big proportion of the value of the phone that you have already paid for.
For new customers, sure it's opt-in/opt-out, buy Apple or not. But if you do, don't be surprised at the next swift one that Apple pulls.
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If "At least they tell you..." is correct, you CAN opt out at any time by not allowing an app to access your location. You can refuse the first time. You can go to the new settings area and turn it off on a per-app basis, and it will show you which apps have requested your location in the last 24 hours.
Perhaps Apple intends to go beyond this, but if not, you have absolute control and can tell exactly what apps are asking and how often. Not bad.
Re:At least they tell you.. (Score:5, Insightful)
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People are sort-of forced to use the phone, since they probably have an expensive monthly contract, and the summary says you can't add more apps/music until you agree to the new agreement -- that's a main feature of the phone.
Though, if I owned an iPhone I'd consider taking it back to the store if I was required to accept this new agreement. Fortunately, this country has reasonable laws that could probably help here -- though IANAL. (Those laws being the ones that prevent a company having a one-sided "agree
Free Market BS (Score:5, Insightful)
And I call BS on your free market democracy ("your dollars are your vote"). You're right about one thing though; we don't need new laws to prevent this. We need the old laws that allow companies to lock down devices that their customers own (DMCA, etc) removed so that we have a real Free market.
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The problem here is you are using a phrase ("Nobody is forcing people to use this phone") that is commonly employed by apple fanatics to assert that the only people who have a right to complain about apple are those people that have bought the right to do so (by buying an apple product, why the hell would I do that if I don't like them?) and that people should simply not purchase their products instead of complaining. The reasoning is of course flawed, nobody expects M$-flamers on slashdot to purchase and
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[...] if you don't want to have these things don't use it. Nobody is forcing people to use this phone [...] Who cares if it's retroactive? It's a service and service and privacy agreements get updated *all the time*. You pay for that service. [...]
Reading comprehension fail. Let me try again: People who already own an iPhone are forced to accept terms that were not part of the original deal in order to continue to receive software updates - which, as far as I can tell, is a prerequisite for receiving support when issues arise - or to purchase new apps. Altering a contract unilaterally after the parties involved agreed on it is subject to legal restrictions. Apple can try, but I would not be surprised to read about them getting handed their balls in c
Re:At least they tell you.. (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:At least they tell you.. (Score:4, Insightful)
Certainly. But people really need to be made aware that they should not buy from Apple if they don't want to be spied on. Don't you agree?
Of course you don't: if you did, you wouldn't cough up that bullshit pseudoargument of "don't buy it if you don't like it" (i.e.: "stop complaining, as no one forces you to buy it").
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No, your pseudoargument is bullshit because it states something reasonable ("you don't have to buy it") while arguing something which is not ("so quit whining").
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You're missing the point dear fanboy nr 9283476573,5 (yeah you're a half person, at least these numbers say so! sry!)
The point is that this policy _did not exist when you bought the phone_, you are then FORCED to accept the new policy if you want to be able to get more apps, or just updates the ones you own. Oh yeah, you can also sell the phone for a lesser value than you paid for it, and likely you're subsidized so you're going to have to pay a new one full price like $500 or $600 (while your subscription
No opt-out??? Try https://oo.apple.com/ (Score:2)
Don't buy the phone if this bothers you. That's the opt-out.
You can either go here: https://oo.apple.com/ [apple.com] on your iPhone, iPod or iPad and op out. The support page [apple.com] is typically vague and talked about disabling cookies "and other technologies in mobile advertising services" which can cover just about anything. Mind you the opt-out page showed an error (HAHA!) when I tried it with my iPhone 3GS so I'll stick with the old-fashioned solution which is to turn off location services completely. IMHO location services soak up battery life and they aren't so useful that I ha
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You can either go here: https://oo.apple.com/ [apple.com] on your iPhone, iPod or iPad and op out.
Thats for opting out of iAds. You've already agreed to the Terms to allow them to see/store/share your location. Disabling iAds, or even disabling the location option in your iPhone doesn't nullify that part of the contract, and probably doesn't stop them getting your location either. If the police can easily do it, I bet the manufacturers can - and you've agreed to let them.
... the c
Don't believe me? Its right there on the page: "Opting out applies only to Apple advertising services and does not affect
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AFAIK shutting down the location services means shutting down or disabling the GPS hardware so you are either suggesting that the GPS hardware can't be disabled or that Apple is remotely activating the GPS system in iPhones whose owners have shut it off in order to track the owner.
The iPhone has both GPS and AGPS. You'd only completely disable location tracking by turning off the cell reception too. That would make it pointless as a phone! As I mentioned, this is the same method police use to pin-point mobile phone locations. Accuracy varies.
If you leave location services on and disable access by app you may not be able to stop Apple from tracking you which I pointed out. You are quoting me completely out of context.
I didn't quote you out of context, I quoted the whole of the first paragraph of your comment. Perhaps you should've structured your comment differently if it's unclear.
Don't believe me? Its right there on the page: "Opting out applies only to Apple advertising services and does not affect ... the collection and dissemination of location data."
Which one? It does not say that on the support page I linked to so you must be talking about the opt-out page???. I never got far enough to successfully opt out, the page shows an error message claiming I don't have iOS 4 installed which is funny because I installed it yesterday (hence the big fat: HAHA!).
Good to see Apple's upgrading systems are successful then. Is a shame you didn
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"Opting out applies only to Apple advertising services and does not affect" the collection and dissemination of location data.
But the system opts in everything else (Score:2)
"Opting out applies only to Apple advertising services and does not affect" the collection and dissemination of location data.
The collection and dissemination outside of advertising (iAds) would mean that the application would have to use location services - which prompts you if it's OK to share your location, and can be disabled at any time for any app.
So it's still opt in, because you have to agree to provide location when you run the app.
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Wrong. You have to agree to the new terms if you want to update you iGadget.
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Righto, however technically the troll is correct as well. The downside to not opting in is that you are now stuck with a phone and possibly outdated apps and OS that you can't update until you pay/agree to their NSA "time and space tracking" ransom.
Re:At least they tell you.. (Score:5, Informative)
"Who tells you that might be happening if you have an Android phone? Or if you install a browser that enables the geolocation services of HTML 5 on your PC (eg http://html5demos.com/geo [html5demos.com] )? No one. They don't have to."
Wrong. Each time you install an Android app, before accepting installation you've given a run down of what permissions the app requires, this includes things like internet access, or making phone calls, but also includes things like judging your rough location using cell masts etc., or judging your fine grained location using GPS. Regarding Google services doing geolocation, that's an option you'll get first time you turn your phone on and can easily change in the menus later if you choose if it has the Google apps pre-installed. I'm not sure why you think they can't stop it on Android, because Android has a marketplace too and all but the most technical users who know the risks anyway use this path for installing apps.
As for IP based geolocation on a PC, frankly I could care less. Even if I'm not using a VPN or something the best they can do is judge my location to be in an area large enough to contain a population of 20 million people. Apart from telling my country that's largely useless information, and that's all it's really used for as it's all that it can be used for, certainly it's not really enough to track you as an individual over and above what your IP already allows.
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The HTML5 site gave my location as Bank Station (City of London), which is 15km away. (I'm in London though).
Another site gave my location as Crawley, West Sussex, England (~50km from where I am).
This one [my-i-p.com] comes very close: it says I'm about 5km away from where I really am.
I assume various companies have gathered databases of IP locations, but some are better than others. I'm guessing my ISP (or their ISP, or whatever) is based in Crawley, and that a company with a nearby IP is based in the City, and another
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The link in question works using a browser feature that uploads information about you such as your IP, access points near you, and that sort of thing. This is why Google was farming access point data when they did street view.
So in the case of even these most intrusive things, the GP I was responding to is wrong regarding warnings, because your browser warns you. My comments were really targetted towards general IP geolocation that doesn't depend on browser uploads.
Personally I'd just keep browser based geo
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Your browser implements the geolocation api. It could be doing various things to do that: e.g. it might send your router (AP) MAC address to a google server that sends back a location that google has harvested with their street view cars...
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Perhaps this method could be automated for a more accurate geolocation service?
Re:At least they tell you.. (Score:5, Informative)
Who tells you that might be happening if you have an Android phone?
The Android Operating system tells you on installation.
Or if you install a browser that enables the geolocation services of HTML 5 on your PC?
Well, that browser is also an application - and android tells you on installation that it can access (amongst others), the following permission: "Your Location: coarse (network based) location, fine (GPS) location."
No one. They don't have to. They can't really, because there isn't a "gatekeeper" controlling it all.
Don't believe everything the iPhone fanboys tell you. The above statement is totally incorrect.
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When I visit that website in my browser (firefox) I get a little bar at the top asking if I want to share my location with the website. So I vet the sites myself on a case by case basis rather than having Apple decide for me. I am under the impression that Android has a similar permissions system when you install an app.
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Who tells you that might be happening if you have an Android phone?
wrong.
on android, and app must explicitly declare the services it needs to access in its manifest, and those permission are shown to to the user before they install the app. that includes permission to obtain the user's location.
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Also, if you have a rooted phone, you can install DroidWall, so by default unless you go in and allow Android to let an app communicate via 3G or Wi-Fi, it won't be able to communicate out. This is good for those apps that ask for full network rights without any need for them.
Not an Apple issue (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Not an Apple issue (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes but if a cell phone carrier tried to do this, they would lose plenty of consumers to the competing carriers.
Re:Not an Apple issue (Score:5, Insightful)
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Cellular providers MAY be doing this. Apple IS doing this.
I wonder which one I am going to express more concern about...
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Unless all the competing carriers were also doing it.
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Sorry, what is new about this?
European GSM operators routinely sell customer locations to third parties. Real-Time traffic jam warnings used by car navigation software makes extensive use of this.
The mobile phone data is also much more accurate than Apple's application layer reporting -- as the mobile phone is always broadcasting its location.
And no, it still doesn't make me feel warm and fuzzy about apple.
Who would trust Apple with (Score:4, Funny)
this degree of Latitude?
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That's funny - we should coordinate these type o' graphic comments
do the moral thing, iPhone developers (Score:2)
Do the right thing: for every app you write, upload user location data every 15 minutes for three months. After that quarter, publish the movements of your users to a site with an innocuous name like, say, www.findoutwhethermyiphoneusingpartnerisacheatingbastard.com. Even if you didn't upload other identifying data, it would be very easy to filter on individuals by listing a few places you know they visit. Indeed, I'm sure any intelligence service worth its secret budget tracks people who may be carrying u
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Someone is paying for the data, show what Apple is selling.
Adamo Bove, head of security at Telecom Italia did show what could be done with the tracking in the case of the CIA rendition team in Italy (2006).
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"This app wants to use your location. Allow?"
* taps "Don't allow"
Problem solved.
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If I ask to borrow your lawnmower, I probably mean that I want to use it right now rather than every 15 minutes for the next three months. Which does Apple allow?
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You *probably* mean that, but what assurance do I have that you'll give it back?
To be fair, both requests are vague, and now Apple's has a further clause that it did not have before that you have to dig in the small print to find.
You can just say "no" though.
The next iOS EULA (Score:5, Funny)
I've heard it will introduce Ius primae noctis
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Droit_de_seigneur [wikipedia.org]
The worrying part will be reading how Apple fanbois will be very proud of having Jobs "test ride" their brides.
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I think they would be jealous of their brides.
Redownload (Score:3, Interesting)
Can you still re-download apps you purchased under an old agreement without signing the new agreement?
Finally a tool for locating 'cheap' iPads (Score:2, Funny)
Considering the other attractive, valuable goods their owners may also have the value of this data to criminals will be quite high.
Of course it is safe (you can trust Apple) and their servers are secure (nobody ever hacked a Mac) and their partners can be trusted (AT&T are a good company).
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Actually, on a serious note, this is what I'm concerned about. By itself, Apple doesn't care one whit about what I am doing. However, there are companies and people who would love to have real time location data:
1: A DA is looking to run a query of anyone who is in a park after dark. She gets the iLocation data, finds a number of people's phones were in the area, then arrests them all for criminal trespass up to two years (statute of limitations) after the fact. This evidence easily persuades a jury to
Anybody care to comment on... (Score:4, Interesting)
Secondly, as this is Hobson's Choice [wikipedia.org] (Accept or lose access to the App Store) will it fall foul of unfair terms in consumer contract legislation?
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Firstly, will this bring about any (if present) early termination clause in contracts as a "significant change in terms?"
Would it be even possible to break the contract with AT&T, if you no longer agree with the new terms of Apple? I only have the iPod, although from what I understand it would make this fancy smart phone practically pointless with out all the apps..
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Only if the PS3 also does. I'm guessing since it benefits a corporation and not the citizens, it's going to be fine.
There is a simple fix (Score:3, Informative)
Now you can choose which apps are able to access your location information, or disable this feature altogether. Was that really so hard?
Re:There is a simple fix (Score:5, Informative)
Except that's only for apps you download/run. It's nice but.. ... your phone is still sending regular "anonymized" data to Apple (and only Apple, which then sells it to 3rd parties) according to TFA.
Just opt out... (Score:5, Informative)
That's about iAd, coming out July 1. According to the agreement (which practically no one reads), you can opt out by visiting this website with your iOS device:
http://oo.apple.com/ [apple.com]
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That makes it so much better.
Steve has Altered the Deal... (Score:5, Funny)
... pray he does not alter it further.
One pod (Score:2)
Hail to Lord Steve who did remarquable Jobs :
"One Apple to rule them all, One Apple to find them,
One Apple to bring them all and in the darkness bind (blind ?) them."
Or as Hamlett might have said, something is rotten in the board of Apple.
Somebody tell me again ... (Score:2)
It's like going to the shop to buy an ice-cream and coming back to find some squatter living in your house.
So disable location services for applications... (Score:2)
If an application requests access to your current location it gets added to the "Location Services" control panel and your answer is remembered. Here you can also change access permissions for all apps that previously requested access to your location.
If you allowed some app access to your location, but change your mind, you can disable access again. Before applica
Privacy violations? (Score:3, Funny)
There's an app for that
Jobs the hypocrite? (Score:2)
Hypocrite: [merriam-webster.com] a person who acts in contradiction to his or her stated beliefs or feelings.
Apple wants to share your location with the world, yet Steve Jobs doesn't even put license plates [osxdaily.com] on his car for undisclosed (privacy?) reasons.
This is why I use Google (Score:2)
And according to Ars Technica... (Score:3, Informative)
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"Until they agree, they cannot download anything through the store."
Lrn2read.
Won't be long before it is not (Score:3, Insightful)
and you find yourself not able to get updates of any sort. Since the "i" devices are so intertwined with iTunes it pretty much guarantees you will have to keep current eventually. Having an opt out on what is nearly mandatory software isn't much an opt out is it.
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You think too much (solly, I'm still in SE Asia).
This is overbuilt and fraught with legal woes. All they need to do is link each account to a "randomised" primary key, that way they can still stay it's anonymised ("not personally identifiable" I believe is the catch phrase) whilst allowing Apple and it's partners to know who they should target. With this they can make sure all Iphone owners in Leeds are directed towards t
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This is overbuilt and fraught with legal woes. All they need to do is link each account to a "randomised" primary key, that way they can still stay it's anonymised ("not personally identifiable" I believe is the catch phrase) whilst allowing Apple and it's partners to know who they should target. With this they can make sure all Iphone owners in Leeds are directed towards the nearest weahterspoons rather then a decent pub, meanwhile Apple are protected because they are just a bunch of unidentifiable numbers.
Until one of those partners happens to be Facebook, Google, Twitter, Myspace, Microsoft, etc. Once they can link up one or two "randomized" location histories with times and IPs that certain users log in from, BAM! those users are tied to a "randomized" primary key.
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The quotes were meant to indicate sarcasm. I know it's pretty hard to do over the intertubes.
Of course this is what will happen and what I was eluding to (you did put it a but better though). Tying a user to a randomly selected primary key s
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No, they will say something in "corporate speak" that translates to "We are very sorry, but we didn't think anyone would actually notice this."
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There, fixed that for you.
I think Apple has well and truly planned for any potential backlash. They'll backpedal and say "look we care about your privacy" and two months later Apple will be selling your data to the highest bidder.
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And, interestingly enough, that post was made before yours. Perhaps you'd like to read slashdot more thoroughly - while there may be the haters and fanbois and Steve-is-the-Dark-Side jokes, there's also informative and interesting posts to be found.
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You already know what you need to do, and it's the antithesis of being here: RTFA
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One of these, you see, is normal human social behavior. The other is more than a little creepy, and something mo
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After all, if you aren't doing anything wrong, why would you care if someone is watching you?
It just proves that Apple owners are the most honest, clean (no porn!), decent people in the world.
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I'm not baiting you here but why do you care about an anonymous account of your location?
I'd love to know how you think any phone can be anonymous.
I guess if you managed to get it on PAYG, without giving any contact details away to your mobile phone company, without giving any details to iTunes, and without storing any numbers or addresses on your phone at all... Then I guess you might be anonymous. Oh, unless you sign into a website which shares info with Apple, of course.
It's not always about being anonymous. Sometimes it's just not trusting a company with every single detail about what you