SAN FRANCISCO — Privacy watchdogs are demanding answers from Apple about why iPhones and iPads are secretly collecting location data on users — records that cellular-service providers routinely keep but require a court order to disgorge.
It’s not clear whether other smartphones and tablet computers are logging such information on their users. And this week’s revelation that the Apple devices do wasn’t even new — some security experts began warning about the issue a year ago.
But the concern, prompted by a report from researchers Alasdair Allan and Pete Warden at a technology conference in Santa Clara, Calif., raises questions about how much privacy you implicitly surrender by carrying around a smartphone and the responsibility of the smartphone makers to protect sensitive data that flow through their devices.
Much of the concern about the iPhone and iPad tracking stems from the fact that they are logging users’ physical coordinates without users knowing it — and that information is then stored in an unencrypted form.
Researchers emphasize there’s no evidence that Apple itself has access to this data. The data apparently stay on the device itself and the computers the data are backed up to. Apple didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
Tracking is a normal part of owning a cellphone. What’s done with that data, though, is where the controversy lies.
Location data is some of the most valuable information a mobile phone can provide because it can tell advertisers not only where someone’s been but also where they might be going — and what they might be inclined to buy when they get there.
“We’re not sure why Apple is gathering this data, but it’s clearly intentional, as the database is being restored across backups and even device migrations,” Allan and Warden wrote in a blog post announcing the research.
