Wednesday, March 3, 2010

What Your iPhone Apps Know About You

Andy Greenberg (via Nicolas Seriot):

There’s no doubt, Shields says, that phones are still much safer from spying software than PCs, which allow software to be installed from any source, often invisibly, as in the case of “drive-by downloads” by infected Web pages or booby-trapped e-mail attachments. But the wide privileges given to phone apps still create exploitable vulnerabilities in devices, says Shields.

I’m more worried about software from the App Store. I don’t believe Apple’s screening process can offer significant protection, and the phone is so locked down that users can’t easily audit what the apps are doing.

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I think this is just a problem living with pervasive networking. On the Mac we have tools like Little Snitch to let us know what apps are phoning home, but even that isn't perfect.

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