Soon, your iPhone will show exactly where apps tracked you
What's the story
After making privacy its calling card, Apple is doubling down on it. The company recently unveiled iOS 13 with plenty of privacy-focused capabilities, including a feature that shows exactly where apps tracked your location. The option is enabled by default and can help you stay clear of apps that mine location data even when it's not needed. Here's all about it.
Pop-ups
Occasional pop-ups highlight location tracking
As the folks at 9To5Mac, who tried the developer beta of iOS 13, report, the new OS shows occasional pop-ups notifying about apps accessing location in the background. The pop-ups show a detailed map revealing the exact locations where the app in question has been tracking you. And, apparently, this would work for all apps, even those built by Apple itself.
Explanation
Also, you will see a detailed explanation
What makes this feature particularly interesting is the fact that along with a detailed map, the pop-up will also show an explanation from the developer revealing why they need location access in the background. Using this information, you could easily decide for yourself if it is really necessary for the app in question to use location or not.
Change
Then, you can tweak location permissions
After deciding whether background location access should be given, you can either select 'Always allow' or 'Change to only while using' option on the pop-up. The former will let the app use location in the background, while the latter will restrict location access to the time when the app is running actively. Beyond that, the app won't know where you are.
Advantage
This can discourage developers from stealing location
While this feature will keep you more aware of apps using your location, it will also discourage developers from mining location data without any specific need. Apple App Store policies are already very rigid when it comes to data collection, and this particular change will further deter developers from tracking you unnecessarily. To note, the option would work only on iOS 13 and iPadOS.