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Fitness App Runkeeper Secretly Tracks Users At All Times, Sends Data to Advertisers (androidauthority.com)
An anonymous reader writes: FitnessKeeper, the company behind running app Runkeeper, is in hot water in Europe. The company has received a formal complaint from the Norwegian Consumer Council for breaching European data protection laws. But why? Runkeeper tracks its users' location at all times -- not just when the app is active -- and sends that data to advertisers. The NCC, a consumer rights watchdog, is conducting an investigation into 20 apps' terms and conditions to see if the apps do what their permissions say they do and to monitor data flows. Tinder has already been reported to the Norwegian data protection authority for similar breaches of privacy laws. The NCC's investigation into Runkeeper discovered that user location data is tracked around the clock and gets transmitted to a third party advertiser in the U.S. called Kiip.me.Finn Myrstad, the council's digital policy director, said: We checked the apps technically, to see the data flows and to see if the apps actually do what they say they do. Everyone understands that Runkeeper tracks users while they exercise, but to continue after the training has ended is not okay. Not only is it a breach of privacy laws, we are also convinced that users do not want to be tracked in this way, or for information to be shared with third party advertisers.
Not surprisingly, it is a free app(with in app purchases-not sure how that works with a running app, but whatever). They had to be getting their money from somewhere....
The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for it to be pitted against a slightly greater evil
Have gnu, will travel.
If I'm going over my monthly data cap because an app it using up my bandwidth, can I ask them to reimburse me for added data costs? Seems fair to me...
I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
Cyclists are worse.
I'm not surprised at all, I would like someone to do this analysis with the Garmin Connect app. A while ago it was updated so that you couldn't connect the vivosmart directly to your phone without doing it through the app. Then, another update the app isn't even usable unless you turn on location services. So for someone like me whose use case is mostly so I don't have to pull my phone out of my pocket to check/ack a page and occasionally for exercise. It became a piece of junk that sits in a drawer.
You can write whatever you want in your EULA, even with "user consent" (i.e. nobody reads those damn things, they're 20 pages long and requires you to be a lawyer to understand half of it) it cannot overrule the existing laws of the country.
Sister got Dad a fitbit as a gift. It wants so many permissions in Android that the family decided not to install, activate, or use it. Seems corporations view people as marks to be fleeced instead of valued customers.
That's am immediate uninstall then. I'm personally not that fussed about being tracked, it's more a concern on battery drain from an app that shouldn't be doing it!
Never met one that didn't tell the world when and where they ran.
How would you know? If you met a jogger who didn't tell you anything about their jogging then you wouldn't know it. You would just assume that they were non-joggers and your preconceived notions about joggers would remain untested.
I agree it's a violation of user privacy but still I'm curious about what the tracking data shows. For example I wonder what percentage of those exercising hit up a donut shop after they're done.
When joggers don't jogg, they're just ordinary, but fit, people. Some of those actually care about privacy.
Its one thing to share where you ran. Its another to share your location at all times.
I was going to do Shocked! but you've gone and beat me to it.
If they can, they will. Why is this so hard to understand? Why do we think automated, dragnet surveillance knows the difference between "good guys" and "bad guys" (as if there was some binary, defining property)? Why do we think we Totes Dodge The Bullet because we clicked some "No thanks" checkbox with carefully phrased wording?
Security doesn't have this problem. When they see an access, they assume everything's been hoovered up. Why would it not? When they see a vulnerability, a potential means of discernment, they assume it WILL be used and must be corrected until inaccessible.
Inaccessible in their vocabulary means hard walls, not words and paper walls.
Just downloaded my data and uninstalled the app from my phone.
No time for BS like this, the meager benefit derived from the app was definitely not worth it.
You can write whatever you want in your EULA, even with "user consent" (i.e. nobody reads those damn things, they're 20 pages long and requires you to be a lawyer to understand half of it) it cannot overrule the existing laws of the country.
Going to be awesome to start to see these companies who believe they can get away with spying on everyone unravel as privacy laws and awareness of creepy stalker mentality that pervades this industry is brought out of the shadows.
Doesn't matter since that shit carry very little weight here...
my iPhone says that the app wants access to GPS even when I am not using it or have opened it. So these get uninstalled again. I believe the last one I tried was Waze.
The first link goes to a website named "Android Authority"; the article in the second link includes the phrase "...the Android version of the app...". Anyone know if the iOS version is doing this also?
"Don't blame the log for the fire." --Andrew Ratshin
Its one thing to share where you ran. Its another to share your location at all times.
Which it cannot do. Privacy settings on iOS9 for Runkeeper has only two settings: never, and only when app is active. What is stated in the summary should not be possible.
If they can, they will. Why is this so hard to understand?
It's not, and I kinda figured apps like this may very well be doing this. But when it's confirmed that they are, well, bye bye...
Welcome to the world of "Surveillance Capitalism"... you are the product they are selling.
I don't read your sig. Why are you reading mine?
There are only two location sharing options, Never and while the app is active. If they're bypassing this on iOS 9, Apple has got some problems.
The App is snooping, it has been outed, it is simply a matter of time, next security update will blacklist the app, revoke all it s privileges and all is well in the world, right?
In reality, people who rooted their phone, run a security manager that sandboxes all apps and prompts for every network access, will be safe. People who trusted Apples and Googles to keep them safe would be taken to the cleaners.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
That is a bit presumptuous. Maybe the first think he asks people when he meets them is if they jog...
Some apps that you really want demand all sorts of capabilities that you do not want to give to them. Some will not install or behave badly if you do not grant what they want. What is needed is a 3 way grant of permissions: yes (allow), no (do not allow), lie (use a contact list of: mickey mouse, the queen, pres obama, ...; location: North Pole; ....) like that they are happy and just report to their masters junk information.
I know I'm shocked that this information-gathering gadget was in fact gathering information.
Just cruising through this digital world at 33 1/3 rpm...
In the US maybe you can put a lot of stuff in some state like enforcing arbitration and giving up rights, but in europe we take a deem view of this, you cannot waive your fundemental rights, and, depending on the juridiction, either be those clause are waived , and can in some cases up to nullify a contract. In this case data protection comes in, and I am guessing that kiip.me will find itself in very hot water rapidly.
C. Sagan : A demon haunted world:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0345409469/
visit randi.org
Anyone who has gotten burned by this kind of crap and is surprised, hurt, or indignant, please repeat after me: "If I'm not paying for the product, I AM the product". Now, continue to repeat it, out loud if necessary, until it sticks. Make it a daily mantra. When you see a 'free' service you're interested in, if your immediate thought is "how will I and / or my data be taken advantage of if I sign up for this?", then you've successfully activated your best protection against being an unwitting victim of 'free'.
'The Economy' is a giant Ponzi scheme whose most pitiable suckers are the youngest among us and the yet-unborn.
Never met one that didn't tell the world when and where they ran. They're like vegans in that regard. I doubt many of their users will care.
Here.
There are a lot of casual joggers in the world, who don't make it a religion but use an App simply to track or to remind or because they can.
Just like there are a lot of people in the world who sometimes eat a lunch that would qualify as vegan, not because they think anything about vegan food, but simply because their choice of what to eat that day turned out to be so.
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
There's very useful service https://tapiriik.com/ (free and open source https://github.com/cpfair/tapi... ) that lets you migrate workouts between different fitness apps. It supports runkeeper, strava (my favourite), endomondo, garmin and even dropbox.
-- mg
If you're transmitting data to a service provider, that data will be sold.
Prove it that you're the only Locke2005. I am Locke2005 too. :P
Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
So that explains why my battery life has tanked since I installed Runkeeper...
F' them.
- For the complete works of Shakespeare: cat