Keeping your data hidden from Apple is ‘almost impossible’, experts have warned.
A new study suggests that default apps on iPhones, iPads and MacBooks are collecting your personal data, even when they appear to be disabled.
This is the first study to examine the privacy settings of Apple’s default apps, specifically looking at Safari, Siri, Family Sharing, iMessage, FaceTime, Location Services, Find My and Touch ID, to see if the corporation lives up to its slogan: ‘Privacy. It’s Apple.’
Associate Professor Janne Lindqvist, Head of Computer Science at Aalto University in Finland, said: ‘We focused on applications that are an integral part of the platform and ecosystem.
‘These apps are glued to the platform and almost impossible to get rid of.
‘Because of the way the user interface is designed, users don’t know what’s going on.
‘For example, the user is given the option to enable or disable Siri, Apple’s virtual assistant. But enabling only applies if you use Siri voice control.
‘Siri collects data in the background from other apps you use, regardless of your choices, unless you understand how to go into the settings and specifically change it.’
The team notes that protecting your privacy on an Apple device would require expert knowledge and persistence.
They also found that the online instructions were not only confusing, but did not list all the necessary steps or explain what happens to the collected data.
To test whether the average user can successfully protect their data, the researchers organized interviews in which participants were asked to try changing their settings.
They saw that participants managed to take a step or two in the right direction, but no one managed to fully protect their privacy, and everyone took a long time to find and adjust the settings.
Amel Bourdoucen, PhD researcher at Aalto, said: ‘The online instructions for restricting access to data are very complex and confusing, and the necessary steps are scattered in different places.
‘There is no clear direction whether to go to application settings, central settings – or even both.
‘It turns out that participants were unable to prevent any of the apps from sharing their data with other apps or the service provider.’
The researchers say they can’t be sure what Apple does with the collected data, but they predict it’s mostly to train the AI behind Siri and deliver personalized experiences.
The study, which will be presented in mid-May at the prestigious CHI conference, details a number of suggestions on how to improve the guidelines in the future.
For individual applications, they suggest choosing a third-party service such as trading in Safari for Firefox.
Metro.co.uk has contacted Apple for comment.
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