Both Android and iOS are responsible for sending user data to Google and Apple, respectively, but a new study reveals that Android might be sending a lot more than its competition. As more people get smartphones, smart wearables, smart home devices, etc., the subject of digital privacy becomes increasingly more important. Whether it be misbehaving apps, people falling for robocalls, or lacking privacy policies from tech companies themselves, it can be easy to feel like nothing is truly private in the online world.
With there being so much debate around digital privacy, a lot of comparisons are drawn between the big tech companies that are responsible for so much of what people do. Facebook is relentlessly criticized for its collection and use of people’s data, Twitter came under fire for its big bitcoin scam hack back in 2020, Amazon’s Ring security cameras have been bashed for a myriad of reasons, and so on and so forth. Thanks to a recent study conducted by researcher Douglas Leith, the privacy comparison between Apple’s iOS and Google’s Android has been brought to the forefront.
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As reported by Ars Technica, the study looked at how Android and iOS share data with Google and Apple under a few different scenarios — including a device’s first boot after a factory reset, inserting/removing a SIM card, letting the phone sit unused, and more. Both Android and iOS were discovered to be sending varying types of user data back to their respective companies in most of these scenarios, though the amount of data differs considerably. Leith found that iOS sends about 52KB of user data to Apple every 12 hours, where Android sends about 1MB during the same amount of time. While those are both pretty small numbers on their own, they translate to all global Android devices sharing 1.3TB of data compared to iOS’s 5.8GB.
That obviously isn’t a good look for Google, and following the release of Leith’s study, a Google spokesperson told Ars Technica that the research isn’t accurate. According to Google, “these findings are off by an order of magnitude, and we shared our methodology concerns with the researcher before publication.” Google compares its collection of data to how modern cars send parts and safety data back to their own companies, noting that the data Google collects helps, “ensure that iOS or Android software is up to date, services are working as intended, and that the phone is secure and running efficiently.”
With a topic like this, it can be looked at from both angles. Even if there was some type of error in Leith’s actual research, the difference that was discovered between Android and iOS is still quite staggering. Combined with the fact that Apple has traditionally been more privacy-focused than Google, it’s not difficult to imagine that Android collects more data than iOS. But at the same time, does any of it really mater? Anyone with a smartphone (or any smart device) should go into it with the assumption that some type of data is regularly being collected and sent to the parent company. That’s just how these gadgets work, and that’s exactly what Leith was able to prove. It’s not to say that Apple or Google is doing anything nefarious with this data — just that its collection is a normal part of using them. That may not sit right with everyone, but it’s the reality of modern technology in 2021.
Next: Apple Bares All As It Lists Privacy Labels For All Of Its Apps
Source: Ars Technica
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