Although Apple’s fixed the location tracking problem, their Q&A explanation of the issue was defensive and baffling. Yesterday, before a Senate hearing on privacy and location tracking, Apple showed that they’re still talking out of both sides of their EULA.
The questioning, lead mostly by Senator Al Franken, reached its peak at this point, wherein the nonsensicality of Apple’s We’re not tracking you, we’re just tracking you, rationale was nailed directly. They got called out. Hard. “It doesn’t appear that both of these statements could be true at the same time,” Franken politely puts it. He’s given a complete non-answer (But hey! It’s a Senate hearing! What else would you expect?), and from there the questioning and testimonies veered wildly into irrelevance. By the end of the hearing, Apple and Google’s reps were being grilled on drunk driving, prompting some serious “Why the hell did I fly to DC for this” inner monologue, I’d imagine.
But having Apple’s incoherent take on the issue put on the federal griddle was important – and that someone in a position of power was willing to call them out felt very reassuring. It’s no coincidence that the funniest people are usually the smartest.
warcroft
Thursday, May 12, 2011 at 8:59 AMUnder the 1996 Telecommunications Act, the FCC mandated that by October 1, 2001 a quarter of all new cellphones be equipped with GPS functionality that would allow authorities to track the location of users. By the end of 2002, this became a mandatory requirement of all new cellphones.
“Cell phone tracking was propelled by the Federal Communications Commission, which adopted enhanced 911 rules to cover wireless services. For E911′s first phase, cellular carriers must be able to pinpoint, to the nearest cell tower, the location of someone calling 911. For Phase II, carriers must be able to pinpoint a 911 caller’s location to within 50 to 300 meters,” states the article.
Your cellphone has been tracking you in real time for the last decade, so why has it taken the media nearly 10 years to notice? Because in 2001, when such measures could have been made illegal, there was no iPhone, there was no app store, and the smart phones being used were extremely crude compared to today’s models and no one had any idea it was happening.
Two articles from 2001, just before the tracking was implemented:
http://www.geek.com/articles/mobile/automatic-gps-on-your-cellphone-2001101/
http://www.pcworld.com/article/55986/will_big_brother_track_you_by_cell_phone.html
warcroft
Thursday, May 12, 2011 at 9:28 AMAnd this article from 1998!!!
http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/news/1998/01/9502
klaw81
Friday, May 13, 2011 at 2:23 PMYou need to realise the difference between the 2 methods used here:
The Government can obtain, at any given time, the CURRENT location of a user’s phone. There’s no record of where the user’s phone has been in the past – just a continuously updated realtime location of the device. In contrast, Apple has in effect programmed iPhones to actively log the phone’s location for up to 12 months.
There’s also a question of whom the information is available to – I would argue that there are reasonable grounds for the government to obtain a realtime location of a user (requires a warrant or similar judicial oversight) but there’s no good excuse for Apple to obtain and store this data.