Apple Sued Over Mobile App Privacy

Apple and four app developers have been hit with a lawsuit that alleges violations of computer fraud and privacy laws by allowing ad networks to access users’ personal information.

The suit was filed on Dec 23 by the law firm KamberLaw on behalf of Jonathan Lalo, a Los Angeles County resident, in federal court in San Jose, California. It seeks class-action status. The complaint names app developers Pandora, Dictionary.com, The Weather Channel and Backflip Studios, the maker of the Paper Toss app, as well as Apple. The complaint accuses Apple of allowing ad networks to track users’ app activity based on a unique identification number. It also charged that apps were selling other information to ad networks including “users’ location, age, gender, income, ethnicity, sexual orientation and political views.”