WASHINGTON (AFP) - Apple on Wednesday rejected requests has been followed by users of the iPhone, but said it aloud software "bugs" which gave rise to being non-localization data encrypted and stored for a year.
"Apple is followed not the location of your iPhone", the California-based company said in its first response to the privacy issues raised by a pair of researchers. "Apple has ever done and has no intention to ever do so."
Apple said the iPhone was not logging location of the user, but maintain a database of close to Wi - Fi access points and the towers of cell for "help your iPhone quickly and accurately calculate its location when asked."
According to British researchers, iPhone and iPads iOS 4, the latest operating system, running have been storage of latitude and longitude coordinates into a hidden with a timestamp file and the data was easily located.
"By opening a session passively your location without your permission, Apple allowed for anyone of a jealous spouse a private investigator to obtain a detailed picture of your movements," they said.
Apple said the location data, researchers have seen on the iPhone are "not the past or the current iPhone location, but rather the locations of the Wi - Fi hotspots and towers of cell surrounding the location of the iPhone, which can be more than a hundred kilometres from the iPhone".
"Calculate the location of a phone using only GPS satellite data can take several minutes," said Apple. "iPhone can reduce this time to a few seconds using cell tower and Wi - Fi hotspot data."
"These data are sent to Apple in an anonymous and encrypted form", Apple said in a 10-point statement presented as questions and answers. "Apple could not identify the source of these data."
Apple said the cache location data is encrypted on the iPhone in a free iOS software update in the coming weeks and can be deleted when the localization Services feature is disabled on the device.
Apple also said it expected reduce the amount of time the Wi - Fi and data cells of the tower are stored on the iPhone as much as from one year to seven days.
"The reason that the iPhone stores data so is a bug that we found and plan to correct little" says Apple. "We do not think that the iPhone has need to store more than seven days of these data".
Apple said was using location data to help target advertising, but was not shared with third parties unless it has explicit approval of a user.
In an indication of how seriously Apple takes allegations of privacy, CEO Steve Jobs has interrupted his sick leave to address the issue.
"We have not followed any person," jobs said in a telephone interview with the Digital blog of all things Mobilized.
"The files they find on these phones, as we explained, he proved were essentially the files via anonymous, crowdsourced information that we collect tens of millions of iPhones out there, we have built," said jobs.
Us legislators this week invited Apple and Google to attend a hearing on privacy next month following claims that the iPhone and Android devices have been regularly followed location of the user and store the data.
The House energy and the Committee of trade also sent letters to Apple, Google, Microsoft, Nokia, Research in Motion and Hewlett-Packard asking if their devices are followed, storage and sharing locations of users.
Jobs said that apple would probably send a representative to the hearing of the Senate.
"I think that Apple will be testifying", he told Mobilized. "They have asked us to come and we will honor their request, of course."
Technology companies also said jobs have done a job bad education users.
"As" new technology comes in society that there is a period of adjustment and education, he said. "" "". We do not, as an industry, is a very good job educating people, I think, to some of the things more subtle going on here.
"As such (people) jumped to a lot of wrong conclusions in the last week."
Apple shares have been decreased by 0.15% to $349.89 in afternoon trading on Wall Street.
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