Newsflash: Apple Doesn't Have Your Interests at Heart, Wants to Make a Quick Buck

I'm going to keep my commentary on this to a minimum, because I know that the various rabidly pro-Jobsian geeks I love will jump on me, but hey!  Here's the article, kids:

"Apple Inc., maker of the iPhone and iPad, was accused in a lawsuit of allowing applications for those devices to transmit users’ personal information to advertising networks without customers’ consent.

Shhh!  Jobs can hear you.

"The complaint, which seeks class action, or group, status, was filed on Dec. 23 in federal court in San Jose, California. The suit claims Cupertino, California-based Apple’s iPhones and iPads are encoded with identifying devices that allow advertising networks to track what applications users download, how frequently they’re used and for how long.

"'Some apps are also selling additional information to ad networks, including users’ location, age, gender, income, ethnicity, sexual orientation and political views,' according to the suit."

While it is unclear to me whether these "identifying devices" are placed by Apple or the apps' creators, isn't it Apple's responsibility to keep this crap from giving our personal information to strangers?  I find it amusing that the creator of the iconic "Smashing Big Brother" commercial has now been subject to a lawsuit accusing them of BECOMING Big Brother.



[Bloomberg]