Apple boots privacy name-and-shame app Clueful from store
iPhone fans denied right to know what's fondling their data
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Apple has pulled from its App Store a utility that revealed how the software installed on iPhones is fondling punters' data.
The Clueful app was created by security company Bitdefender and approved to go on sale in May. However, the privacy tool was yanked this week for reasons that are unclear.
Clueful analyses apps installed on an iPhone, and then names and shames those misusing fanboi data. A study of 60,000 popular apps found, for example, that 42.5 per cent do not encrypt users’ personal information, even when sending it over public Wi-Fi. Two in five programs can track a user’s location, and almost one in five apps access the entire address book on an iOS mobe.
It is unclear why Apple removed Clueful. As ever, the Foxconn-marketing biz chose not to comment on its App Store ruling.
Bitdefender said "Apple informed our product development team of the removal - for reasons we are studying - after it was approved under the same rules". The Reg pushed for more details on the notice to no avail.
It's possible some fanbois were misusing Clueful or that other app developers complained about it. Perhaps Apple took exception to Bitdefender's claim that its code can "find out what your iOS apps are really doing", although that would be inconsistent with their previous decision.
As with other applications removed from the App Store, Clueful will continue to work for people who have already downloaded it. But it may cease to work if an iOS update rolls in and breaks the software.
Apple's software review process is famously opaque, with some odd decisions over the years. ®
COMMENTS
"It is unclear why Apple removed Clueful. As ever, the Foxconn-marketing biz chose not to comment on its App Store ruling."
Is it? I don't think so. It's cause the foxconn rebrander is as bent as a thrupenny bit! The iSheep dont care, or should I say don't undersatnd the relevance.
Lack of transparency
Less technically savvy users could get a little scared by an app which tells them how their data is being used, possibly?
What pisses me off no end about Apple, is that they just never say why - there's ZERO transparency.
Remember that good old 1984 advert, waaaay back in the day?
There's more than a little irony in the fact that Apple seem to have become what they despised about IBM.
The Jobs reality distortion field often bordered on Doublespeak.
If you read the biography, it's clear Jobs held consumers, generally, in contempt.
"I'll tell them what's good for them because they don't know themselves"
Sure, Apple products are slick, but it's the ethos that bugs the hell out of me.
Ultimately, however, it's about choice - and if you use Apple, they tend to choose for you...
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