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HTC confirms security hole, says patch is incoming
HTC held true to its promise to look into the security vulnerability that surfaced over the weekend, an apparent glitch that allows any app requesting internet access to take a peek at a user account information, GPS location, system logs, and other potentially private data. While HTC assured us that user data isn't at risk of being harmed by its own software, a third party malware app could exploit the security flaw and cause some trouble. The outfit is already building a patch, and will ship it out in an over the air update after a short testing period with its carrier partners. Until then? HTC recommends steering clear of apps from publishers you don't trust. Hit the break to see the official statement.
Mango kills Microsoft's always-on location tracking, makes good on letter to House of Representatives
Remember all that iPhone tracking hubbub back in April? Sure you do -- you probably also recall Apple's denial, the subsequent Senate hearing, and the rest of the fiasco's dramatic fallout. Amid the ballyhoo, Microsoft stepped out to admit that its Windows Phone also collected location data, but quickly promised to knock it off following the next scheduled update. According to ChevronWP7 collaborator Rafael Rivera, Windows Phone 7.5 cinches it: Mango "no longer sends location data prior to being granted permission to do so." Redmond previously told the US House of Representatives that it only collected location data if a user expressly allowed an application to send it along -- a claim which Rivera debunked last week, noting that simply launching the camera application captured and transmitted "pin-point accurate positioning information." The big M maintains that the collected location data was anonymous, and that it shouldn't have been sent at all unless the user allowed it. Either way, Microsoft's chapter in the big location tracking blunder of 2011 seems to be at a close, squaring the firm with Congress, its developers, and hopefully its customers.
HTC security vulnerability said to leak phone numbers, GPS data, and more, HTC responds (video)
The folks at Android Police seem to have stumbled across a rather jarring security vulnerability in HTC handsets running Android, giving common apps with internet access a peek at the device's vital statistics, user information and more. Demonstrated in the above video, developer Trevor Eckheart found that a recent HTC update packed in a suite of logging tools that collects data on user accounts (including email addresses), recent GPS locations, SMS data and encoded text, phone numbers, system logs, running processes and more -- all of which can be accessed by common apps requesting access to android.permission.INTERNET. HTC is already looking into the issue, stating, "HTC takes our customers' security very seriously, and we are working to investigate this claim as quickly as possible. We will provide an update as soon as we're able to determine the accuracy of the claim and what steps, if any, need to be taken." If you're too antsy to wait for HTC's update, head on over to the source link below -- Eckheart says the issue can be resolved by removing HTCloggers from a rooted device.
Intel to acquire Telmap, dole out easy to implement location APIs to AppUp developers
In case you weren't watching, Intel's Elements 2011 Keynote slipped in a sly acquisition announcement: the firm recently signed a deal to absorb Telmap, an Israel-based outfit whose location platform is the backbone of countless navigation apps. Intel's Peter Biddle says the navigation firm is to become a wholly-owned subsidiary of Intel, and will help AppUp developers pack their apps with unique location capabilities via Telmap's standardized APIs. Biddle wraps it up simply enough: "New advanced capabilities with just a few lines of code." Details on the deal are scarce, but hit the source link below to see Biddle's full statement in Intel's AppUp wrap-up.
McAfee and Intel partner up to put anti-theft tech in Ultrabooks
Intel has long provided hardware-level anti-theft technology, primarily for its enterprise customers. But, as users become increasingly mobile, the need to extend those protections to average consumers has become more and more apparent. McAfee is teaming up with Chipzilla to create a consumer-friendly software package that will interact with the chip-level anti-theft tech that will be packed into every Ultrabook. Details about the software are pretty slim for the moment, but we know it'll feature remote lock, remote wipe and location tracking to help you recover you precious lappy and keep your personal data out of the hands of ne'er-do-wells. The suite will start shipping alongside the tiny notebooks next year, but while you wait, check out the PR after the break.
KDDI's Mi-Look watches your elderly parents, treats them like prisoners (video)
KDDI's looking out for Japan's elderly, or putting them under house arrest -- it's hard to tell which. Hitting stores this September in the land of human-assistive tech, the Kyocera designed Mi-Look is a simplified GPS-capable, mobile-monitoring system that puts you in control of your Luddite parents. The waterproof device packs a strap-activated "I've fallen and I can't get up" buzzer and comes in an appealing shade of hospital white, all while keeping track of your folk's whereabouts. Seems innocent enough, right? Well, it's not really up to Ma and Pa to opt-out of location tracking -- the phone does it automatically, emailing a list of relatives with coordinates and distance traveled. And for that extra special Lindsay Lohan-lockdown touch, the charging port's sensor will not only count the number of times your rents pass by, it'll also answer calls automagically. Starting to feel a little bad about this? We don't blame you, but keep in mind the compassionate tech's being targeted to patients with memory loss issues. Still, we have a suspicion those with claims of a "stolen childhood" might be using this as revenge. Payback's a cellphone, apparently. Video demonstration after the break.
Apple forced to cough up cash over iPhone location tracking in South Korea
You probably thought all the drama surrounding the iPhone location tracking fiasco was over. Oh, how wrong you were. In fact, the controversy seems ripe for a resurgence after a Korean court ordered that country's Apple arm to pay 1 million won (about $946) to Kim Hyung-suk. The payment was awarded last month, but now Kim's law firm is prepping a class action suit that could put further pressure on the Cupertino crew -- especially in the home of Samsung. This could just be the first in a series of pay outs, as even American courts may look to the decision when considering the fate of other plaintiffs looking to ring a few bucks out of iDevice purveyors. Hit up the source link for a few more details and a host of non sequiturs. [Thanks, Wesley]
Microsoft outlines WP7 tracking policy, promises to cut it out
Microsoft has managed to avoid a good deal of the heat surrounding the smartphone tracking freakout of the past few weeks, largely missing out on the media finger pointing and, unlike Apple and Google, avoiding the Senate hearings. For those worried that Redmond got off scot-free, have no fear -- Congress asked the company to respond to questions via letter, and Windows Phone head Andy Lees happily replied, stating that, while the OS does, in fact, have tracking built-in, it's intended for "landmarks not users," collecting the locations of things like cell towers and WiFi access points. Just to be safe, Lees also promised that, like the iOS 4.3.3 fix, the next WP7 update will do away with some of that controversial tracking.
OpenPaths lets you visualize your iPhone location data, donate it to science (video)
What use could science possibly have for your iPhone location data? Well, you won't be curing cancer, but you could theoretically be contributing to epidemiology, land use surveys, or a study proving that people move around just as quickly on foot in New York as they do inching down the 405 in LA. At least that's the idea behind OpenPaths, a web-based tool that lets you securely and anonymously "donate" your cache. If you've upgraded to iOS 4.3.3, your iPhone will no longer store your location, but there should be plenty of coordinates spinning around on your hard drive to play with. After downloading the OpenPaths Uploader, you'll be able to visualize your own location information, and even if you've somehow deleted the data from your computer, the tool will search Time Machine backups (for Mac users) -- a little scary, no? Of course, there's always potential for misuse with any such service, but a researcher probably won't care that those late nights at the office were actually spent in Cindy's home office, unless that researcher also happens to be your wife.
Senate committee hearing on mobile privacy now underway, watch live
You might want to put on a pot of coffee for this one, but the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee hearing on mobile privacy and locating tracking is now underway, and you can watch it live at your choice of the links below. The hearing is broadly titled "Protecting Mobile Privacy: Your Smartphones, Tablets, Cell Phones and Your Privacy" and, as the early going has already shown, it will be covering issues far beyond the recent privacy issues surrounding Apple and Google, although representatives from both companies will be on hand to answer the Senators' questions. Update: You can read Google's full testimony to the committee on its Public Policy Blog. Its main argument is that location-based services provide "tremendous value to consumers," but that they can't work without the trust of users, which is why it has made location sharing on Android devices "strictly opt-in." You can also read Apple's testimony here (PDF). In it, the company's Vice President of Software Technology, Bud Tribble, flatly reasserts that "Apple does not track users' locations -- Apple has never done so and has no plans to ever do so." He also insists that the location data Apple has collected is actually the location of cellphone towers and WiFi hotspots, not the users' location, and that it is being used for a crowd-sourced database as it has previously stated. As an independent expert also testifying pointed out, however, that data could still be used to pin down a location or trace a person's movements to as close as a few hundred feet or so -- assuming they aren't in a rural area with few WiFi hotspots and cellphone towers.
iOS 4.3.3 is out, location tracking 'fix' in tow
Apple's promised update to iOS to rectify what it perceived as a set of bugs in the system -- namely, an excessively large cache of location information that was backed up to iTunes and hung around even after you switched Location Services off -- is now being distributed to iPhones, iPads and iPod touches out in the wild. To exterminate those problematic aspects of your OS, you know what to do -- hook up to iTunes and get downloading. And yes, it's the full 666.2MB file as usual. P.S. - iOS 4.2.8 looks to be out for Verizon iPhones as well, though we haven't verified this for ourselves yet. Still, it's the same set of changes and the same method to obtain the latest firmware. [Thanks to everyone who sent this in]
Apple officially answers questions on location tracking, says it doesn't do it
1. Why is Apple tracking the location of my iPhone? Apple is not tracking the location of your iPhone. Apple has never done so and has no plans to ever do so. The big hubbub that arose last week around location tracking within the iPhone has now received its due response from Apple itself. Firstly, the Cupertino company claims it does not, and has no plans to, track users' iPhones. What it's actually doing is "maintaining a database of Wi-Fi hotspots and cell towers around your current location," which are then used to provide speedier calculation of your position when you want to use the device's maps or other location-based services. The data collection that was recently brought to the public attention represents, according to Apple, the location of WiFi hotspots and cell towers around you, not your actual iPhone. Still, the fact iPhones have been shown to store as much as a year's worth of data is considered a bug by Apple, who plans to limit that period to a week in a future software update. The additional issue of data being collected after users turned off Location Services is also a bug, also to be fixed by Apple in that upcoming update. Left unanswered, however, are the questions of when Apple "uncovered" these bugs, as it claims, and why the fix for them is only coming now. Specialists have known about this behavior since at least September of last year. Either way, the software remedy is promised over the next few weeks, while the next major iteration of iOS should encrypt the cache file that's been the subject of all the scrutiny. You'll find the full Q&A after the break. P.S. -- One of Apple's answers seems to disclose an extra bit of new information: "Apple is now collecting anonymous traffic data to build a crowd-sourced traffic database with the goal of providing iPhone users an improved traffic service in the next couple of years."
ATP's GPS Photo Finder geotags your pix OTG
If you're heavy into geotagging -- and we think you are -- you may want to look into an interesting new product from ATP (no relation to the multifunctional nucleotide of the same name) called the GPS Photo Finder, a unique device which automatically tags your digital pictures with latitude and longitude, without the need for a PC nearby. The little rectangular box works by reading SD, MMC or Memory Stick data and then tagging pictures on the media with location coordinates (as long as your camera is synced to the clock of the Photo Finder). The internal 128MB of memory allows for roughly 550 hours of tracking, and the pictures / GPS data can be read by any application capable of handling geotagged images (such as Picasa). The device is scheduled for mass release in the first quarter of 2008, no word on price right now.[Via Coolest Gadgets]
MIT launches iFIND app for stalking your friends
When we first spotted MIT's location-tracking WiFi network last year, the stalking capabilities were interesting, but not fully realized. Now with this new iFIND app of theirs, WiFi positioning takes on a whole new level of geeky functionality at the Boston campus. At its core, iFIND is a peer-to-peer application that allows users to control the flow of their own location information, eliminating the privacy concerns of a centralized tracking system. Built on top of that functionality are all sorts of interesting buddy list capabilities to track and chat with friends, and choose who can track you. You can also set up meeting places with friends, even using the system to pick a spot at the "center of gravity" of a group of friends for the ultimate in geek cred. Anyone with an MIT email address can use the system, and future functionality includes the ability to share data anonymously with users found with the system, or to alert the police to your position in an emergency without divulging your identity -- all for the truly paranoid, but fun stuff all the same.[Via Smart Mobs]
