Windows phones send user location to Microsoft - Page 2

**orangekid** · #11 (**permalink**) 04-28-2011, 07:06 PM

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (Linux; U; Android 2.3.3; en-us; HTC HD2 Build/FRG83D) AppleWebKit/533.1 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0 Mobile Safari/533.1)

it does say they collect GPS data, so you never know what they're doing with it

**schettj** · #12 (**permalink**) 04-28-2011, 09:02 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dude111

Windows phones send user location to Microsoft ? The Register

No surprise at all!!

Im glad i dont own even a basic cell phone! (I havent ever liked any of this newer stuff,its all spying garbage)

Yeah, if only it was true, it would be even more terrifying.

Are you the same awesome dude on dslr? If so, LOL.

**orangekid** · #13 (**permalink**) 05-11-2011, 11:19 AM

If you check out the PDF on MS response to the location thing

http://blogs.technet.com/cfs-file.as..._-5.9.2011.pdf

you can see that

"2. Observing Location Only When the User Needs It. Microsoft only collects
information to help determine a phone’s approximate location if (a) the user has
allowed an application to access and use location data, and (b) that application
actually requests the location data. If an application does not request location,
Microsoft will not collect location data."

notice on "b" they word it pretty cleverly that if an app requests the location data, it will be "collected" so they do, per this, collect the location when "an app requests it"

eric12341 · #14 (**permalink**) 05-11-2011, 09:47 PM

yea but it isn't stored r anything like how iPhone was doing it. what the hell is the big deal about this? ur bank knows everywhere u swipped ur card so should we not do that anymore?

**orangekid** · #15 (**permalink**) 05-13-2011, 03:58 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by eric12341

yea but it isn't stored r anything like how iPhone was doing it. what the hell is the big deal about this? ur bank knows everywhere u swipped ur card so should we not do that anymore?

You should be able to opt out of it if you want.

eric12341 · #16 (**permalink**) 05-13-2011, 04:09 PM

u can by turning off location or by hitting cancel when it asks and the apps I have installed have an option to turn location off. u have a wp7 so I don't know how u could be so oblivious to this.

**orangekid** · #17 (**permalink**) 05-13-2011, 05:22 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by eric12341

u can by turning off location or by hitting cancel when it asks and the apps I have installed have an option to turn location off. u have a wp7 so I don't know how u could be so oblivious to this.

I am not oblivious to it, but even if you turn off location on your phone they can still get your coordinates by prompting the OS for it if the app makes a request. You can still be triangulated.

Maybe it does not store it locally on the device like iPhones do, but if you are going to use a Cell Phone, you can and are going to be tracked.

That's my point.