• Home
  • Apps
  • Apps News
  • Most Android, iOS Apps Share Personal Data With Third Parties: Study

Most Android, iOS Apps Share Personal Data With Third Parties: Study

Most Android, iOS Apps Share Personal Data With Third Parties: Study
Advertisement
Mobile apps have long been under scrutiny for sharing user data apart from hiding malware as well as adware. Now, a new study has claimed that on an average an Android app sends sensitive data to 3.1 third-party domains while iOS app connects to 2.6 third-party domains.

The study titled "Who knows what about me? A survey of behind the scenes personal data sharing to third parties by mobile apps" also points out that apps on Android and iOS today "do not need to have permission request notifications" for user data like PII and behavioural data.

According to the findings, Android apps are more likely to share personal data such as name and email address than iOS apps. The iOS apps, on the other hand, are more likely to share location data such as geo-coordinates than Android apps.

The study chose 110 popular free apps (as of June-July 2014) from the Google Play and App Store across 9 categories including job listings, medical, and location apps. "For each app, we used a man-in-the-middle proxy to record HTTP and HTTPS traffic that occurred while using the app and looked for transmissions that include personally identifiable information (PII), behaviour data such as search terms, and location data, including geo-coordinates. An app that collects these data types may not need to notify the user in current permissions systems," explains the study.

"The third-party domains that receive sensitive data from the most apps are Google.com (36 percent of apps), Googleapis.com (18 percent), Apple.com (17 percent), and Facebook.com (14 percent)," notes the report.

Out of the selected apps, the study found 3 out of 30 apps medical-related apps sharing medical search terms and user inputs with third parties.

It also showed that 93 percent of Android apps connected to a mysterious domain, safemovedm.com. The study claimed that it could be due to a "background process of the Android phone." One of the most important findings showed that the majority of mobile apps sharing data with third parties no longer required permission to access the data. This particular problem can be expected to be resolved thanks to Android 6.0 Marshmallow's all-new App Permissions feature that offers users greater control of app permissions in the latest Android build.

Last month, Apple removed hundreds of apps from its App Store that collected personal data.

Comments

For the latest tech news and reviews, follow Gadgets 360 on X, Facebook, WhatsApp, Threads and Google News. For the latest videos on gadgets and tech, subscribe to our YouTube channel. If you want to know everything about top influencers, follow our in-house Who'sThat360 on Instagram and YouTube.

Further reading: Android, App Store, Apple, Apps, Google Play
Ketan Pratap
Ketan Pratap is the editor at Gadgets 360 - with over 12 years of experience covering the technology domain. With a breadth and depth of knowledge in the field, he's done extensive work across news, features, reviews, and opinion pieces. But what's truly inspiring about Ketan is how he spends his free time. He's often found gazing at snow-capped mountains from over 20,000 feet while sitting on the hood of his car, taking in the breathtaking beauty of nature. His passion for the great ...More
US Office of Personnel Management Hires Expert on Cyber-Security
Facebook Music Stories Lets Users Share Spotify, Apple Music Clips
Facebook Gadgets360 Twitter Share Tweet Snapchat LinkedIn Reddit Comment google-newsGoogle News

Advertisement

Follow Us
© Copyright Red Pixels Ventures Limited 2024. All rights reserved.
Trending Products »
Latest Tech News »