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Watch Out for Mobile Data Transparency in 2018
As of right now, any app maker catering to an American audience has a remarkable amount of latitude for collecting data. They can track mobile users by location at any time, whether or not the application is running; they can track how often people are using different apps; they can compile and analyze and sell all sorts of datasets -- and they never have to tell their users they're doing so. There is no such thing as mobile data transparency in the United States.
(Spare me the "But what about the terms of use for the app?" rebuttal. When was the last time you saw one of those documents plainly outlining what data an app maker would be tracking and what it would do with that data?)
Related: IT Departments Lagging in Preparing for GDPR Privacy Rules: Study
Contrast that to the pending implementation of the European Union's General Data Protection Regulation. Developed to strengthen individual citizens' rights to data privacy, and to simplify the regulation of data export outside the EU.
As of right now, any app maker catering to an American audience has a remarkable amount of latitude for collecting data. They can track mobile users by location at any time, whether or not the application is running; they can track how often people are using different apps; they can compile and analyze and sell all sorts of datasets -- and they never have to tell their users they're doing so. There is no such thing as mobile data transparency in the United States.
(Spare me the "But what about the terms of use for the app?" rebuttal. When was the last time you saw one of those documents plainly outlining what data an app maker would be tracking and what it would do with that data?)
Related: IT Departments Lagging in Preparing for GDPR Privacy Rules: Study
Contrast that to the pending implementation of the European Union's General Data Protection Regulation. Developed to strengthen individual citizens' rights to data privacy, and to simplify the regulation of data export outside the EU.
