iPhone privacy warning: Apple's devices track users' locations and store the data forever

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Tracking device: Some iPhone users could have a year's worth of information about their location stored on their phoneApple has been accused of putting customers' privacy at risk after it emerged their iPhones track users' locations and save every detail to a secret file.Security researchers found the device saves the latitude and longitude of users' locations, along with a time stamp, then copies the data to the owner's computer whenever the two are synchronised.This means anyone who stole the phone or gained access to the computer it is paired with could build a detailed picture of the owner's movements.'Apple has made it possible for almost anybody a jealous spouse, a private detective with access to your phone or computer to get detailed information about where you've been,' said Pete Warden, one of the researchers who discovered the file.Mr Warden and his fellow researcher Alasdair Allan have set up a web page to inform the public about the file, and to give away a programme that lets Apple users check what location data the phone is storing.Other GPS enabled smartphones do not have the same function, they said. 'Alasdair has looked for similar tracking code in [Google's] Android phones and couldn't find any,' Mr Warden told the Guardian.
'We haven't come across any instances of other phone manufacturers doing this.' However, it has emerged that Apple's iPad device also records location data.
Although mobile phone networks routinely record the locations of mobile phones this information is only available to police and other government agencies under the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act.

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By contrast, if a thief were to steal and 'jailbreak' an iPhone he could extract the location database directly.
Indeed, anyone anyone with access to an iPhone user's computer could run Mr Warden and Mr Allan's application and see a visualisation of the phone's movements.The application shows the phone's location on a map. Anyone running the programme can see the see the phone owner's location on a specific date; all the locations a user has ever visited with their phone; or an animated map of the user's movements over time.

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Detailed picture: Researchers have created a computer programme that can access the file and display the data stored on an interactive mapIt is understood the tracking started with Apple's iOS 4 update, published June 2010, meaning that some phones could contain almost a year's worth of data on their owners' whereabouts.
The iPhone records the information whether or not its user agrees to being tracked. And Apple has not revealed whether the function can be disabled.Daniel Hamilton, director of privacy campaign group Big Brother Watch, said: 'I think the most concerning thing is that people are simply unaware that this vast database is being created.'He added: 'People ought to be able to move around freely without accumulating a digital record of all their movements.'This application poses a significant risk to personal privacy. Information logged by the phones could, for example, be accessed by jealous spouses or business rivals keen to know someone's location at a particular time.'Apple has a duty to immediately provide their customers with details about how to disable t! his inva sive software.'