Apple pledges to curb collection of location data
Apple has blamed programming errors for its collection of data that tracked the rough location of iPhone users and pledged to drastically cut down on the practice that has alarmed consumers and privacy advocates.
After a week of increasing criticism and regulatory attention over the issue, the company said that it should not have been compiling the information on users who turned off location-based services. It added that it should not have stored the records for a year.
“The reason the iPhone stores so much data is a bug we uncovered and plan to fix shortly,” the company said. “We don’t think the iPhone needs to store more than seven days of this data.” The furore echoes Google’s privacy gaffe with its StreetView service, in which fleets of cars sent out to take pictures recorded personal data. Google’s unauthorised data collection was uncovered by German regulators, prompting the company to drop the practice.
