Comments on: Tinfoil Hat Brigade UNITE! Apple is tracking your IMEI number…just like every other phone carrier…. http://www.applegazette.com/iphone/tinfoil-hat-brigade-unite-apple-is-tracking-your-imei-numberjust-like-every-other-phone-carrier/ Apple Gazette - An Apple Blog Fri, 19 Mar 2010 23:36:45 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.2 hourly 1 By: obi http://www.applegazette.com/iphone/tinfoil-hat-brigade-unite-apple-is-tracking-your-imei-numberjust-like-every-other-phone-carrier/comment-page-1/#comment-41772 obi Mon, 19 Nov 2007 18:25:15 +0000 http://www.applegazette.com/iphone/tinfoil-hat-brigade-unite-apple-is-tracking-your-imei-numberjust-like-every-other-phone-carrier/#comment-41772 Transmission of several phone/sim-card identifiers (IMEI, IMSI, MSISDN, etc) within the GSM network is absolutely neccessary to ensure correct functionallity. However, I doubt that sending the IMEI over the internet serves any purpose in operating a wheater or a stock widget :) Maybe except for Apple to make sure their service is only used be iPhone owners. IMHO, this is sort of a privacy breach. I would not care too much about transmission of the IMEI, but imagine suddenly your MSISDN (your phone number) would pop up in an HTTP request, visible for everybody .... Or imagine the evil Redmond company would do things like that ... I feel like Apple should be more careful/sensible with these things. Transmission of several phone/sim-card identifiers (IMEI, IMSI, MSISDN, etc) within the GSM network is absolutely neccessary to ensure correct functionallity.

However, I doubt that sending the IMEI over the internet serves any purpose in operating a wheater or a stock widget :)
Maybe except for Apple to make sure their service is only used be iPhone owners.

IMHO, this is sort of a privacy breach.
I would not care too much about transmission of the IMEI, but imagine suddenly your MSISDN (your phone number) would pop up in an HTTP request, visible for everybody ….

Or imagine the evil Redmond company would do things like that …

I feel like Apple should be more careful/sensible with these things.

]]> By: David Tanzer http://www.applegazette.com/iphone/tinfoil-hat-brigade-unite-apple-is-tracking-your-imei-numberjust-like-every-other-phone-carrier/comment-page-1/#comment-41760 David Tanzer Mon, 19 Nov 2007 17:21:54 +0000 http://www.applegazette.com/iphone/tinfoil-hat-brigade-unite-apple-is-tracking-your-imei-numberjust-like-every-other-phone-carrier/#comment-41760 The people at Heise security have tested it, and the IMEI parameter of the URL does not contain the IMEI number of the phone, it seems to be something different: http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/99220/from/atom10 (German only, sorry). The people at Heise security have tested it, and the IMEI parameter of the URL does not contain the IMEI number of the phone, it seems to be something different:

http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/99220/from/atom10
(German only, sorry).

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