• Sprint Yanks Carrier IQ from All Supported Mobile Devices

    by
    Michael Essany
    Published on 2011-12-19 05:55 PM
    9 Comments Comments


    As if Apple's commitment to pulling the plug wasn't sufficient for some, iPhone carrier Sprint is similarly doing away with Carrier IQ across its entire mobile device line. On Monday, Sprint swallowed a bitter pill in the wake of critics blasting the wireless giant for allowing Carrier IQ software on some 26 million of its devices in the United States.

    "We have weighed customer concerns and we have disabled use of the tool so that diagnostic information and data is no longer being collected," Sprint announced in an email to Mobile Burn. "We are further evaluating options regarding this diagnostic software as well as Sprint's diagnostic needs."

    As MMi previously reported, the Carrier IQ software is what's known as a rootkit that is installed at a carrier’s request on mobile phones. Carrier IQ raises user privacy concerns because it runs in the background and monitors and logs user activity. Carrier IQ is believed to be installed on more than 100 million devices around the world.

    Until now, Sprint and AT&T - two iPhone carriers in the United States - claimed that the Carrier IQ software and its collected data have only been used as a means to "improve service performance." As of this writing, Sprint is done dealing with Carrier IQ, although it isn't yet clear if Sprint somehow remotely disabled the software on its devices or on its network.

    Source: Mobile Burn
    This article was originally published in forum thread: Sprint Yanks Carrier IQ from All Supported Mobile Devices started by Michael Essany View original post
    1. Categories:
    2. iPhone,
    3. Apple
    Comments 9 Comments
    1. liquidzoo's Avatar
      liquidzoo - 2011-12-19, 07:14 PM
      Sprint (non-iPhone) users:

      Monitor your daily data. I'd be really curious to see if it goes down now. Sprint's comments to Al Franken were evasive at best. I'm curious as to exactly how much data CIQ was using.
    1. mamipig22's Avatar
      mamipig22 - 2011-12-19, 07:18 PM
      How can we know for sure that it's removed? In the first place we didn't know it was there, and more so we couldn't disabled it, so why should we trust sprint argument?
    1. iZangetsu's Avatar
      iZangetsu - 2011-12-19, 07:27 PM
      They can say anything you want to hear to make you feel better.......I bet it's still there.......
    1. Mlitz69's Avatar
      Mlitz69 - 2011-12-19, 07:29 PM
      So Is this on iPhone too or just androids
    1. epikarus's Avatar
      epikarus - 2011-12-19, 07:59 PM
      I dont think sprint can remove the software from your phone. What they are saying is that they are not collecting data from the phone. I assume the software will still run on your phone sending data that its mined but no one on the other end to recieve it. But trusting the carriers to actually do what they say is another question. How can we tell if our data is not being collected? Somehow someone is going to intercept this information.
    1. Zokunei's Avatar
      Zokunei - 2011-12-19, 08:43 PM
      Is Carrier IQ (awd_ice) on the iOS 5.1 betas?
    1. liquidzoo's Avatar
      liquidzoo - 2011-12-19, 08:51 PM
      Quote Originally Posted by Mlitz69 View Post
      So Is this on iPhone too or just androids
      Apple has said that they've removed (more likely deactivated) it from the iOS builds. The carriers have no control over the Apple software, so this would mostly affect other Smart/Dumb phone users (though I'm not sure if it's even on Dumb Phones).
    1. sryuuza's Avatar
      sryuuza - 2011-12-20, 01:22 AM
      Quote Originally Posted by Mlitz69 View Post
      So Is this on iPhone too or just androids
      Yes, it's on the iPhone. It was disabled in 5.01 and will be removed in 5.1. You can turn off CIQ on the iPhone (the only phone you can do this one).

      Settings > General > About > Diagnostics & Usage > Don't Send
    1. bradp's Avatar
      bradp - 2011-12-20, 04:28 AM
      by turning off CIQ, does this improve sprints network on 3G? that's what sprint needs to concentrate on if they want to continue to keep iPhone customers!

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