New Research: Apple iPhones Allow Personal Data To Be Extracted

Apple Inc. (AAPL) acknowledged this week that the iPhone allows the extraction of users’ personal data, including text messages, contacts lists, and photos, through a previously unpublicized technique by Apple employees. The same can be used by law enforcement agencies and others with access to the “trusted” computers to which the devices have been connected. One major reason some users prefer iPhones over Google Inc.’s (GOOG) Android phones is that the former are supposedly more secure.
But research by Jonathan Zdziarski revealed that the company takes up data for what they say are diagnostic services to help engineers. Furthermore, users cannot disable the services and are not even notified when data is taken. Users have no way to block this from happening in the future. The only way to “un-pair” from existing computers is to wipe your phone clean of all data. Apple defended itself, saying that the data is extracted for diagnostic purposes only, and is used by enterprise IT departments, developers, and Apple to troubleshoot technical issues that might surface. The data is only taken if the user has trusted the computer.

The issue here is not about spying; the concern is that these services extract too much information with too little disclosure, making users helpless. If more data is collected than needed, the security rights of users have been – by definition – violated.

Technology like this can provide law enforcement agencies access to private data, in case the trusted computers of the targeted individuals are confiscated, hacked, or handed over by employers.