Erstellt am: 1. 12. 2011 - 11:46 Uhr

Today's Webtip: Carrier IQ Part #2

looks like your keystrokes are being logged.

You might have heard of the latest mobile tracking scandal. Carrier IQ is a company that produces software that is capable of gathering all sorts of information on your mobile device. The company itself claims to have access to 130 million phones across the globe, including Blackberry, Symbian and Android devices.

Now user tracking is nothing new. The iPhone and Android devices were shown to be storing GPS information last year, and mobile carriers themselves have long been capable of following their users, storing that information for varying periods of time.

Setting up a new Android or iPhone includes checking a box stating that you are ok with sending anonymous information to the respective company in order to let them track usage patterns in the interest of quality control and improvement. (that's the story at least).

But Carrier IQ software is taking this to a whole new level. One of the best explanations I have been able to find so far is the most recent video made by Trevor Eckhart, the man who first posted information about this several months ago.

You might want to check out the article on Wired as well.

UPDATE: It looks like traces of the software have also been found in iOS, but they are part of the standard diagnostic logging you are asked to allow (or not) during setup. Details can be found here:
www.redmondpie.com