To all those who have downloaded the iOS 12 update or are about to do it, here’s an announcement which might trigger data privacy fears in you. Apple has updated its iTunes Privacy policy earlier this week which states that it will start assigning a ‘Trust Score’ to iOS and tv devices from now on.
Apple Inc’s objective behind offering such a score is to curb fraud, as the propagation of false reviews, false purchases, and spam App store accounts.
In order to assign a trust score to a device, Apple is said to track down phone calls, text messages, emails and online messaging apps on a user’s device. This will help Apple assign every device a score that will help the iPhone maker determine the sanctity of the mobile when a purchase attempt is made through its device.
Apple says that the assigned scores will be stored on its servers only for a specific period of time. The technology giant has clearly specified in its provision that it will not examine the contents of the phone calls or emails as it will only abstract the summary of the data which will never be shared with others.
VentureBeat which was the first to observe this development says that this could again attract the scrutiny of lawmakers and privacy enthusiasts on how the extracted data from the users will be utilized by the company.
Readers of Cybersecurity Insiders have to notify a fact over here that since last month, social media giant ‘Facebook’ also started to give its users a “Trustworthiness score” to cut down the circulation of fake news on its platform. Thus, those who flag content as false on the site would be rewarded with a great reputation score by Facebook after review.
Perhaps, Apple might be following the said lines of Facebook with a different objective and might be quickly joined by Google sooner or later.
