14 DAY TRIAL // It is no secret that Apple collects information about its customers. How much information, how often, and most importantly, what it is used for is less than clear however. Users have now discovered that the company is tracking their iPhone details whenever they perform even the most insignificant tasks such as checking the weather or stocks.
Poking around the iPhone widgets revealed that Apple is collecting information from users whenever they are used. The widgets automatically contact Apple giving out information such as your iPhone's IMEI number, as well as your IP address and stock quote preferences. Such gathering of information is practiced by many services, mainly in order to better serve by giving you custom tailored options. However, in the case of Apple, such information gathering goes well and beyond the norm. Since customers can no longer purchase iPhones without a credit card, the company can connect your contact and credit information to your application usage information to build a very extensive profile on you.
While some users may be outraged at this, it is important to remember that by using an iPhone, and agreeing to Apple's Terms of Service, you do give the company the right to collect information.
" When you interact with Apple, we may collect personal information relevant to the situation, such as your name, mailing address, phone number, email address, and contact preferences; your credit card information and information about the Apple products you own, such as their serial numbers and date of purchase; and information relating to a support or service issue."
The real problem here is just what information is relevant to the situation, and just how much information is Apple really collecting. This information collecting is not exclusive to the iPhone and other users have discovered that Leopard's Calculator application also behaves in a similar fashion. The calculator will try contacting "wu-calculator.apple.com" and the URL in the application code is similar to the ones in stocks and widgets, even down to the IMEI reference.
While the tinfoil hat crowd may have already deleted Apple's snitch applications, or simply stopped using them, regular users simply want to know why Apple is collecting this information and what they are doing with it.