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Friday, August 07, 2009, 04:00 pm
Offender Locator iPhone software exiled from App Store by Apple
Offender Locator, a controversial, high-profile application that allowed users to find registered sex offenders, was removed from the App Store this week.The software from ThinAir Wireless was priced at $0.99, and had resided among the top 10 selling applications in Apple's App Store for weeks. But according to CNet, the application was banished from the App Store for legal reasons.
While those reasons have not yet been made clear, some have speculated that it may be illegal in the state of California for anyone to profit from the sale of publicly-available criminal information. But according to a ThinAir Wireless employee, Sex Offenders Search, a competing application for $1.99, remained on sale even after Offender Locator had been pulled from the App Store.
The software allowed users to see nearby registered offenders based on the phone's current location or by manually entering an address. The program then pulled up a map with pinpoints for each nearby offender. The locations were each selectable, giving users access to the person's picture, a physical description, and information on what crime they were convicted of.
Other stories of applications being approved, only to be removed from the App Store later are not uncommon, though typically that software is not among the top 10 sellers. Perhaps the most high-profile previous reconsideration from Apple was GV Mobile, which was removed only after Apple rejected Google's own Voice application. Apple is even under investigation from the Federal Communications Commission for its rejection of the Google Voice software.
The news comes soon after Phil Schiller, Apple's senior vice president of Worldwide Product Marketing, personally responded to criticism over the company's handling of a dictionary application with questionable content. The iPhone maker has repeatedly come under fire recently for how it handles the approval of applications for the App Store, from the length of time it takes for software to be reviewed to the availability of promotional codes.
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Previous Comments View All
apple is slowly becoming 'holier than the pope' in the sense of not wanting to offend anybody, anywhere, anytime.
another example of so-called 'political correctness gone mad'.
apple is slowly becoming 'holier than the pope' in the sense of not wanting to offend anybody, anywhere, anytime.
another example of so-called 'political correctness gone mad'.
"some have speculated that it may be illegal in the state of California for anyone to profit from the sale of publicly-available criminal information."
Can I get a locator for cops so I can know when it's alright to speed? Actually, I've thought about this before and I can't imagine it would get approved and it would probably be used for crimes but I think it would be cool to have an app that you could fire up and when you see a cop you press a button and it send your GPS location to a central server and that way other people can see where a cop is and when he/she was last spotted. Of course I'm sure that would lead to actual crimes but it'd be nice for traffic since, statistically speaking, cops 1) cause more wrecks than there would be without them sitting on the side of the road clocking people and 2) cause greater congestion by unnaturally slowing down the speed of traffic.
I guess that's a little off topic huh? Eh well, it's Friday! 
"some have speculated that it may be illegal in the state of California for anyone to profit from the sale of publicly-available criminal information."
shhh, you may frighten them with logic.
Really, how hard is it for the software supplier in question to offer it for free? Secondly, I'd like to see them be a little more transparent about what database(s) they use.
I was considering making an app that's similar but I foreseen complications with all 50 states similar issues like this.
Can I get a locator for cops so I can know when it's alright to speed?
Yes. http://www.trapster.com/
Yes. http://www.trapster.com/
Holy crap!!! Score!!
Didn't know that such was available, but very useful app if the databases are reliable. This should be available as a free public service app. I don't know if Apple has considered the potential backlash of NOT putting that app out.
Can you see the lawsuit that Apple would have to deal with from a iPhone user who gets raped, killed or otherwise suffers harm that arguably would not have occurred had the software been made available--I'd think that the legal eagles should seriously weigh rejecting this one long term.
Sex offenders don't have much of a legal voice AND SHOULDN'T; but let someone get hurt because it was rejected? Big check that APple would have to write
Can I get a locator for cops so I can know when it's alright to speed? Actually, I've thought about this before and I can't imagine it would get approved and it would probably be used for crimes but I think it would be cool to have an app that you could fire up and when you see a cop you press a button and it send your GPS location to a central server and that way other people can see where a cop is and when he/she was last spotted. Of course I'm sure that would lead to actual crimes but it'd be nice for traffic since, statistically speaking, cops 1) cause more wrecks than there would be without them sitting on the side of the road clocking people and 2) cause greater congestion by unnaturally slowing down the speed of traffic.
I guess that's a little off topic huh? Eh well, it's Friday!
Yeah, it's called Trapster
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I got this app. Seemed pretty cool.
In the comments, though, lots of people complained that the databases they were using were crap.
One guy/gal was like: I'm a parole officer. I put in locations where I know there are offenders and nothing came up! What database are you using.
There were at least three comments among the top ones with this complaint.
Still, near me there are boatloads of these folks, it seems.... I wonder how many there would be if they were using good data?