Apple are tracking your location

I got an email about this first thing this morning...but only just got round to reading it. Not good at all for iphone and ipad users....

iPhone and iPad can track a user's location history

Security researchers find a hidden data file in the Apple devices that can contain detailed records of user whereabouts.

Apple Inc.'s iPhone and iPad are keeping very close track of where you've been.
Security researchers said they found a file hidden in the operating software of Apple's devices that can contain tens of thousands of records of a user's precise geographical location, each marked with a timestamp.
Those records create a highly detailed history of a user's whereabouts over months or even years.
The data are in an unprotected file embedded in the phone and tablet computer, the researchers said Wednesday, allowing hackers who pick up a lost iPhone or iPad access to the location history with relative ease.
The discovery comes as technology companies are coming under increasing scrutiny for the ways in which they collect, store and share personal information gleaned from consumers' use of digital devices.


Apple, Google Inc.and Facebook Inc., three of the most popular consumer technology companies, have attracted intense scrutiny from regulators and privacy advocates.
Illustrating the data in dramatic, understandable form, security researchers Pete Warden and Alasdair Allan released a software program Wednesday that allows iPhone and iPad users to download and plot their location histories onto an interactive map, showing their trail over time.
The maps show clusters of colorful dots in hundreds or thousands of precise locations visited by the device's user.
"I have no idea what Apple thinks it's doing in collecting this," said Christopher Soghoian, a cybersecurity researcher at the University of Indiana and formerly a Federal Communications Commission employee. "You'd think they would've learned the lesson Google learned, which is: Don't surprise your users on privacy."
Apple raised eyebrows last year when it added a phrase to its privacy policy disclosing that it would "collect, use and share precise location data, including the real-time geographic location of your Apple computer or device." The company said that the data were anonymous and could not be used to identify the original user.
But Allan of Exeter University and Warden, a former Apple engineer, said the cache of location information on a user's iPhone or iPad can be linked easily to the user and is not protected by any security.
Cellphone location data have long been collected by wireless providers to help route calls to mobile users. Law enforcement officials can get access to that data, but it generally requires a court order.
"Now this information is sitting in plain view, unprotected from the world," Warden and Allen wrote in an online post on the O'Reilly Radar technology site. The data are "available to anyone who can get their hands on your phone or computer," they said.
Apple did not return requests for comment.
Many Apple customers were excited about the maps, which aren't as specific as the data used to plot them, and wanted to share their meanderings.
Randy Botti, a web designer in Hawaii, posted a map showing visits to many spots around the coast of the Big Island.
"Here's my iPad location map," Botti wrote on Twitter. "I showed mine, now show yours."

http://www.chicagotribune.com/busine...,2669743.story

We also seem to have a challenge with privacy issues on any phone. There is a device for sale now (it is being used by the Michigan State Police and who knows who else) which can download all of one's location data, plus all texts and addresses and phone logs from not only Apple devices, but almost any smartphone or PDA. And the MSP refuse to state their guidelines for who they will demand this information from - without a warrant or court order of any kind.

I guess 2014 will become the new 1984....

Ahh, technology!

I guess 2014 will become the new 1984.... Originally Posted by topguntex

But how can that be -- we have a Democratic President. Those guys would never trample our rights.

So, governemnt is bad, and corporations are good?

Government has had the ability to check your phone calls, credit transactions, movements to a limited extent, since the passage of the Patriot Act. Mmm, would that be a Conservative President trampling rights?

Now Apple and Google have the ability to do the same thing via your handheld. Government isn't doing it, but is allowing it.

Privacy is not a right guaranteed in the constitution.

I’ve also read that if you take a picture on a phone with GPS capabilities any picture you take will be time and place stamped. So when you load the picture onto Facebook or some such hosting service, the location stamp is still attached. Kinda spooky if you have a picture of you and your family in front of your house. The world at large, should anyone choose to get the information, will know where you live.

Personally, I think they should be hauled into court for putting such an intrusive device with our without warning into our gadgets. Fascism at its newest peak.

I'm inclined to agree with Mr. Pogue here: so what? We've been tracked by marketers (and others) all the time.
http://pogue.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/...g-you-so-what/

Password protecting your ipad or iphone so "others" using your computer cant see where you have been isn't going to do shit for the hackers. They'll just laugh their ass off. As for apple not using it to track us, then why is it there? For our benefit? If so, then why keep it a secret? Why are they not commenting? Sorry SR, but disagree with you comparing this to marketers. Someone knowing what you buy is very different to implementing a device that can be hacked into to show anyone where you are at any given time. It's less about apple knowing where we are and more about unsavoury people. You might not care but I do.

C

The only legitimate guess I can make is it was a resource put there for 3rd party software developers.

The only legitimate guess I can make is it was a resource put there for 3rd party software developers. Originally Posted by charlestudor2005

Calling that "legit" use is a bit of a stretch for me.

I am waiting for the hackers to find that an android OS phone is doing the same thing.

It's like an EZ-Pass (toll RFID device) can in effect track where you are going. I have put my EZ-Pass in the special bag (mutes the ability for the toll readers to "see" the unit) and paid cash so Mrs. SRO doesn't glance at the bill and see when and where I have been going.

I have put my EZ-Pass in the special bag (mutes the ability for the toll readers to "see" the unit) and paid cash so Mrs. SRO doesn't glance at the bill and see when and where I have been going. Originally Posted by SR Only

Hope you always remember to put it back on the window. There might be a little hell to pay if the Mrs. goes blithely through the toll booth thinking the gadget is there to pay the toll and it was still secured away in the bag.

Mrs. SRO has her car and I have the daily driver and a winter beater <http://www.urbandictionary.com/defin...lks down south>. When I roll through EZ-Pass with the unit enclosed, once I am clear of the tolls I reinstall the Pass for just such an event. I recently had to replace the windshield on the DD and Mrs. SRO refused to drive the WB. She likes her AWD sedan (no SUVs for us).

Winter beater: "A girl that you date during the cold winter months, giving you something to fuck while everyone else is staying in, but you drop come summer when all the partying starts back up again."

I surprised Mrs. SRO lets you have one.

I surprised Mrs. SRO lets you have one. Originally Posted by pjorourke

Shhhhhh. Just don't tell her!!!

http://www.appleinsider.com/articles...xt_udpate.html

I assume android is on the same path. But:
http://news.cnet.com/8301-31921_3-20056657-281.html