Josh OngFiled in the United States District Court for the District of Puerto Rico by Lymaris M. Rivera Diaz, the new lawsuit accuses Apple of "intentionally intercepting personally identifying information," The Loop reports. The Weather Channel, Pandora Media and as many as 10 unnamed companies, provisioned as Does 1-10, are listed in the complaint.
According to the report, Apple faces six different charges, including fraud, abuse and unfair trade practices, for its alleged practice of capturing an iPhone's UDID and location data and sending the information to advertisers.
The filing comes on the heels of another lawsuit also targeting Apple and Pandora Media Group. Filed in New York, the lawsuit took issue with Apple's lack of a method to "delete or restrict access" to a device's UDID. The suit also alleges that the company collects data from users without their consent. As with a similar complaint from December 2010, the lawsuit appears to be based off of an article from The Wall Street Journal that highlighted the use of anonymous user tracking in mobile apps.
In April, a class-action suit was filed against Apple over an alleged "location tracking" file in the iPhone publicized by security researchers last month.
Apple has since revealed that the database in question is actually a crowd-sourced database of Wi-Fi hotspots and cell towers. CEO Steve Jobs said in an interview that people "jumped to the wrong conclusions" about the file.
The company admitted that a bug in iOS preserved the data for longer than was necessary. Last week, Apple released iOS 4.3.3 to address the issue.
While testifying at a Senate Judiciary subcommittee hearing earlier this week, Apple Vice President of Software Technology Guy L. "Bud" Tribble reaffirmed the company's commitment to privacy. "Apple is strongly committed to giving our customers clear and transparent notice, choice and control over their information, and we believe our products do so in a simple and elegant way," he said.
For several years now, Apple has been the world's most-sued tech company. As such, the company has brought on several prominent lawyers as outside counsel to protect itself.
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122 Comments
I've said it once and I'll say it again... WTF. That is all.
I'd like to give Apple the benefit of the doubt and say their heart is in the right place. It's just getting harder and harder to do that. The revelation at the Congressional hearings that iOS allows any app developer to pull _all_ your contact information without your permission or even your knowledge was pretty surprising to me, for example.
Apple has since revealed that the database in question is actually a crowd-sourced database of Wi-Fi hotspots and cell towers. CEO Steve Jobs said in an interview that people "jumped to the wrong conclusions" about the file.
Unfortunately for Apple, that file was shown to be able to track one of the folks who testified to Congress to within 20 feet of his actual location as determined by GPS. Also, Skyhook, the originator of the technique used to create that file, says it was designed to track individuals to within 200 - 1000 meter accuracy, not the 100s of miles claimed by Steve Jobs in a press release. http://www.skyhookwireless.com/howitworks/
The lies are wearing thin and it's time for Apple to provide a complete end-too-end privacy policy that isn't packed with smoke and mirrors. They can do it themselves, or they can have the government do it for them.
According to the report, Apple faces six different charges, including fraud, abuse and unfair trade practices, for its alleged practice of capturing an iPhone's UDID and location data and sending the information to advertisers.
BTW, it's probably just a matter of time before lawsuits start appearing because an individual can be identified by their IP address, which Apple records. According to testimony from the Department of Justice the IP address can be used to identify an individual, whereas Apple claims their data cannot be used to identify an individual.
Unfortunately for Apple, that file was shown to be able to track one of the folks who testified to Congress to within 20 feet of his actual location as determined by GPS.
But the file is on the device and maybe on the computer and is not transmitted anywhere. No one has access to that info.
But the file is on the device and maybe on the computer and is not transmitted anywhere. No one has access to that info.
He?s just spreading FUD. Best to ignore him.