There has been serious issues in the past with apps accessing your location data and other information without permission and yet again there is a new case in which more than 1000 Android apps collects users data without their permission.
According to reports by Federal Trade Commission (FCC), researchers have discovered that 1325 apps have found ways to get around smartphone users data who have set permissions to OFF status. The study was conducted looking at over 88,000 Android apps and investigated the user settings on how they handle the data permissions on their mobile phones. The study discovered that as many as 1325 apps had code written to take location data from metadata stored in photos, files and Wi-Fi connections. As of now no Android apps names were revealed because they will be revealed next month at Usenix Security conference event from August 14 to August 16th.
As an example, the report noted that Shutterfly app recorded GPS coordinates of the users from photos and sent that data to its servers although user hasn’t granted the app permission to obtain his location data although it’s spoke-person denied this allegation.
Among the personal data that can be stolen is the user’s location address obtained when a user is connected to Wi-Fi network. Even some apps developers have found ways to obtain Mac address and also steal handset’s unique IMEI number.