It is very common that smartphones pre-installed with weather application to provide latest update on weather in certain location. However, researchers at Carnegie Mellon University found that smartphones was being tracked for 6200 times per participants in over 2 weeks time – that is approximately location reporting for every 3 minutes. Some of the software was pre-installed as factory applications and not easily to be removed. This high frequency of location tracking in mobile phone raises several security and privacy concerns where users location can be exposed to some unauthorized individuals.
Many third party apps developers also use located based advertisement to gain revenue. In previous research, Sadeh and his colleagues found that 73% of the time it in location reporting is involved with an advertising network. However, users may tend to adjust their setting regarding their privacy concerns.
