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Apple's 'Friend Locator' app could allow remote iPhone tracking

Friends could more easily find each other, or parents could track their child's location with a new push-based location service proposed by Apple similar to Google Latitude.

The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office released a new application this week from Apple entitled "Push-Based Location Update." The proposed invention relies on a new iPhone application entitled "Friend Locator" that would allow users of Apple's smartphone to willingly share their location with others.

In the proposed invention, location is shared through updates requested by Apple's push notification service. Users have the ability to automatically share their location via GPS, or manually send an update.

A push update for a user's current location can also be triggered by the owner of another device, who may be requesting the information. This would rely on the the "Friend Locator" iPhone application illustrated in the patent filing.

Signing in with an e-mail address and password, users could access the Friend Locator application that would contain a virtual "Friend List." From here, friends could be tracked based on their name, distance or "visibility," meaning whether the user has turned off location sharing.

Within this application, someone's name could be selected, and their location would show up as a digital "push pin" on a map. From here, directions to the person's location could be obtained.

Users could also choose what information is shared or kept private, such as their home address, mobile number, or current location. The Friend Locator app would also give users the ability to hide their current location from a single, specific user.

Patent 2

The patent application was filed on June 17, 2009, and was made public this week. The proposed invention is credited to Richard Williamson, Christopher Blumenberg, Seejo Pylappan, and Howard James.

The described service is essentially Apple's own take on Google Latitude, which also shares friends' locations and directions to their current spot. But Apple's method would be a native application that could be accessed with an iTunes account login.

The Google Latitude application was initially refused from the iPhone App Store, because Apple was concerned the software could "create user confusion" with the preloaded Maps app. But the Google Latitude app eventually appeared on the App Store earlier this month, allowing users to see where their friends are and share their current location in the background via GPS.



18 Comments

boeyc15 14 Years · 986 comments

Although nice, is this really patent-able? Or should this be patent-able?

appleman1 14 Years · 5 comments

iMeet does something like that, so what is the difference?

chronster 15 Years · 1893 comments

A lot like Google's latitude, but different enough that people will say they did it better, and eventually say they did it first

SpamSandwich 19 Years · 32917 comments

This could instantly destroy every online dating service in existence. Now they just need to add a 'sonar sweep' or Layar-style graphic overlay UI to help pinpoint the other person in a crowd.

lilgto64 19 Years · 1146 comments

where are all the cries of the Orwellian future this will usher in?

Could also be useful for business that want to keep track of where their delivery trucks are for example - tied into other scanner and or credit card scanning etc - could make the iPhone the keystone (or would it be capstone? or cornerstone? or foundation?) of a complete Business Suite for anyone who has people, goods or services that are delivered to the end user.

With proper coding and websites etc - you could track not only the delivery progress of you next FedEx package but also your pizza.