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Locationgate: Apple and Google Know Where You’ve Been

4 May. 2011 | Author: Antonio De Mitri | german

Oh boy…it’s not really that much of a surprise, right? But the outrage is still quite prevalent. At a conference in the USA, IT specialists revealed that iPhones and iPads with UMTS interface save the locations of their users using mobile networks. What really gets the blood boiling is that this data is not encrypted and can be viewed by just about anyone with the help of some special software.
Alasdair Allan and Pete Warden were the ones to announce their self-designed software iPhoneTracker, which displays the localization data on a map. Every device with iOS 4 – so the iPhone 4 or the iPad, as an example – sends a file during synchronization with the computer through iTunes called “consolidated.db”. The users’ geo-coordinates, that are a result of the global positioning function in mobile cells, are saved in these files.

It’s possible that this all may have something to do with the function MobileMe, which can help track down lost iPhones. The data is hidden, but because it is unencrypted, it can be viewed by just about anyone to help reveal the positions of the user, without the user even knowing. What’s really ironic is that the GPS location device, which is very precise, can be turned off at any time…

US politicians do not find this amusing and are demanding consequences: members of congress are demanding an official investigation against Apple. The scandal has released a chain effect: various police departments in the USA have been actively using this information to track down suspects. Two Apple customers have even taken Apple to court in a joint-lawsuit. The US senate has scheduled a hearing for Apple in May.

Google has also been summoned, as the search engine giant has a similar practice with its Android devices. They send their positioning to a Google server. But Mountain View has never really kept this secret. On the contrary: every user of an Android device is asked whether or not Google can collect data anonymously. As a reaction Google proclaimed, “All location sharing on Android is opt-in by the user. We provide users with notice and control over the collection, sharing and use of location in order to provide a better mobile experience on Android devices. Any location data that is sent back to Google location servers is anonymized and is not tied or traceable to a specific user.”

Windows has also been hit by this wave. CNet reports that mobile devices with the Windows 7 operating system also practice location sharing with Microsoft. However, Microsoft discusses this on its website and has explained how to turn off this function.

In the end, it’s an embarrassing mixture of sneaky tactics on the side of the developer and a blind witch hunt on the side of would-be scouts, paired up with the outcry of poor individuals that didn’t read the user manual for their device or service.

Greg Sterling from SearchEngineLand expressed his opinion on the matter: “There’s no way to go backward. We now live in a society where people are leaving an electronic record of their movements, attitudes, behavior, social associations and purchase histories. However, unknown to many people, much of this data (and related “tracking”) has existed offline for years. The key is to give users control and make location and other data collection more transparent.”

Well put, but who knows if that will help at all. In light of the data scandals of the past few years, we’ve noticed a common theme: the pitcher goes often to the well, but is broken at last. Then, Apple, Google & Co. put a few new pitchers on the shelves…

Locationgate: Apple and Google Know Where You’ve Been
Posted in Blogroll, World Wide Web, Discussion, Localization technology | Tags: , , , , ,

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