Apple removes apps that share location data to third parties
Apple has implemented some stricter privacy regulations in its app store apps. According to 9to5Mac, Apple began to remove applications that share location data with third parties without the user’s explicit consent.
According to the email sent to the developer, the removed application violates 5.1.1 and 5.1.2 of the “App Store Review Guidelines”, which means “The application will use the user’s location data without the user’s explicit consent. Send it to a third party, so they must “delete the relevant code, framework or SDK” and resubmit it for review.
Details in the Apple App Store Review Guidelines show that the company expects developers not only to obtain user consent to collect location data more clearly but also to clearly point out where the collected data is used.
Apple will also restrict the data collected from sharing with third parties: “You may not use or transmit someone’s personal data without first obtaining their permission and providing access to information about how and where the data will be used. Data collected from apps may not be used or shared with third parties for purposes unrelated to improving the user experience or software/hardware performance connected to the app’s functionality.”
On May 25, the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) will be fully effective, and most companies in the technology industry will begin to change to comply with the new regulations. Compared with other technology companies such as Facebook or Google, privacy issues have always been a concern for Apple. Facebook and Google use user data to sell ads. However, considering the recent privacy disputes surrounding Facebook and Google (especially the Facebook and Cambridge analytics company scandals), Apple has shifted to emphasize the privacy of user information. Apple hopes to avoid the scandals that arise from the application of apps in the store. These apps share the user’s location data to third parties for unknown reasons.
Apple has many new privacy tools that will be used by users in the European Union and other countries after the EU’s Comprehensive Data Protection Regulation is fully in force. Including managing new pages of Apple id, users can download a copy of all the data stored in the company, as well as the startup screen details of the company’s privacy regulations and how each application uses data.
