Monday, August 12, 2013

feature, benefit, what exactly?





dailymail | Apple is following Google's lead by adding a feature to its upcoming operating system that can track a user's every step.

German security firm Protecus has found a setting in the fifth beta release of Apple's iOS 7 software called Feature Locations that tracks a user's GPS coordinates over time and plots them on a map.

This news comes after code was discovered in Google's Android 4.3 software that lets devices scan for nearby networks, in order to determine a person's location, even when Wi-Fi is turned off.

The Apple feature is relatively hidden away on the iOS 7 software - due to be released in October - in Settings, Privacy, Location Services, System Services and Frequent Locations.

It is unclear whether the feature is turned on by default but according to the Protecus security expert: '[The feature] kept track of my complete movement profile (location and time tracking) without me knowing anything.'

9 comments:

CNu said...

What has changed? Why is there so much social pressure to carry an always-on tracking-and-communication device? How does this behavior pattern fit with what we think we know about human nature, evolutionary biology, and politics?

Uglyblackjohn said...

With the lives of even the most inane being broadcast on television - everyone imagines the he too should be a celebrity. No one wants to feel 'left out'.

Dale Asberry said...

Nah. I'm 13 and None of My Friends Use Facebook seems more likely.

CNu said...

SMS and it's pernicious cousin iOS group messaging seem to be the ageless sine qua nons in my children's connected worlds

Uglyblackjohn said...

You know... I use facebook for the club. Many of my 'friends' use my page to keep up with friends and rivals. The women just check to see what shoes the other women are wearing. Most of my patrons are over thirty so the site seems to work for me (now). I sat talking to a group of younger women and they asked me to start a Pinterest, IMVU (?), and/or Instagram page. I guess by the time facebook figures out how to make money there will be less money to be made.

DD said...

Facebook is for old people now. If we know about it, and use it, the universal truth is that the cool kids have moved on. As a teen, when your Mom joins a site, that's when it's dead.

CNu said...

lol, that's only because she'll friend you and start dropping eaves on you and your nasty little HPV-purveying social network....,

DD said...

Speaking of HPV, what's with that vaccine? I'm generally pro-vaccine (like fluoride, probably not practical for me and mine but hugely socially beneficial with full compliance), but they want my 5-year old to have this one for kindergarten. WTF?! Am I correct that proper child-rearing, particularly for a daughter, makes this one absolutely unnecessary in my legally-liberal, socially-conservative household?

CNu said...

Wife, female pediatrician, maternal social network, all decided on this one and acted long before I had an opinion. Not only are these three shots considered d'rigeur for girls, but boys are being lined up for it as well.

What Is France To Do With The Thousands Of Soldiers Expelled From Africa?

SCF  |    Russian President Vladimir Putin was spot-on this week in his observation about why France’s Emmanuel Macron is strutting around ...