Security Researcher Alasdair Allan at the University of Exeter revealed that iPhone and the cellular iPad regularly recorded the co-ordinates along with timestamp in a hidden file.
Though Apple quickly released an update to fix the location tracking bug, the controversy landed Apple into trouble as they were investigated by privacy regulators in South Korea, France, Italy and Germany.
At that time, Apple clarified that it was not tracking the location of the iPhone or iPad 3G as reported by security researchers. Apple also confirmed that it had never done so and had no plans to ever do so. But Apple admitted that it could do a better job managing the crowd-sourced location database and released iOS software update 4.3.3 to fix the location tracking bugs.
But Apple was still fined by Korea Communications Commission. It also didn’t stop Korean users from suing Apple for illegally enabling location-based features without their consent. The Next Web reports that one such group of 29 iPhone users have backed down and withdrawn their case. The plaintiffs were seeking $800,000 won ($757) per person as compensation from Apple.
The plaintiffs plan to join the bigger class action lawsuit against Apple, which was also filed with the regional court in Changwon, which was also filed in 2011 and involves claims from 27,000 iPhone users. They’re seeking 1 million won per person in damages. One of the reasons for backing down was to avoid any adverse impact from a negative outcome from the Changwon case.
Apple is definitely not out of the woods as in July 2011, the company was forced to pay 1 million won ($1000) in compensation after the court ruled that its location features violated his privacy.
Via: The Next Web
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