When you use Android  and Carrier IQ is running in the background on your phone, Carrier IQ is tracking your data – just a little bit of data. All they are getting is the following:

Every text message. Every web search. Every phone number. The user’s location and the URL of all web sites searched!

Now that’s service! You are not just another customer to Carrier IQ. They want to be close to you every moment of every day. I bet they keep a record of the names of your pets.

I suppose I am just some kind of reclusive paranoid because I can’t seem to feel that they are acting in my best interest. In fact, call me crazy, but I just get the impression that they are stealing private information and converting for their own use.

I am pleased that Al Franken is calling them on the carpet for this, but that’s not what I want. I want the Justice Department to investigate and prosecute these people. This is theft, a form of private espionage. Since these phones are used by government agencies, police, fire departments and the military, I would like an explanation as to how that does not violate The Espionage Act and laws governing homeland security. Isn’t this exactly the kind of data, another country would crave?

James Pilant

Al Franken Calls On Carrier IQ To Explain Mobile Tracking Software

Earlier this week, security researcher Trevor Eckhart posted a video detailing how Carrier IQ’s software — which has the same name — logs every text message, web search and phone number typed on a wide variety of smartphones and reports them to the mobile phone carrier.

The application also logs a user’s location and the URL of websites searched on the phone, even if the user intends to encrypt that data using a URL that begins with “HTTPS,” Eckhart said in the video. The software always runs when Android’s operating system is running and users are unable to stop it.

Al Franken Calls On Carrier IQ To Explain Mobile Tracking Software

Related articles

• Senator Al Franken Demands Carrier IQ Explain Mobile Tracking Software (readwriteweb.com)
• Carrier IQ Gets Hit With US Senate Investigation (gizmodo.com.au)
• 7 questions that Carrier IQ needs to address immediately (zdnet.com)
• Al Franken Gives Carrier IQ A December 14 Deadline To Answer For Privacy Allegations (businessinsider.com)
• Programmer Raises Concerns About Phone-Monitoring Software (bits.blogs.nytimes.com)