https://lifehacker.com/precise-location-is-giving-your-coordinates-away-to-app-1849458216
Your phone is broadcasting your exact location to apps that don't need it.

Unless you routinely tweak your privacy settings, it's likely you're
broadcasting your exact location to any app that wants it.

The issue here is more related to privacy than security.
Keeping precise location disabled for most apps is good privacy practice.

By keeping precise location on, you're sharing your exact location with any
company that's interested (and they're all interested).

While Google tries to stop developers from selling your data to advertisers
and other businesses, it still happens. The good news, if you can call it
that, is all this data is anonymous and not directly tied to you. While it
sounds like your apps are selling your location data to Big Brother to spy
on your movements, in practice, companies use this data to better sell you
stuff.

Still, it's creepy!

Turning precise location off doesn't stop companies from receiving and
selling your location data, but it does stop them from receiving and
selling your exact location.

The problem is, precise location is a sneaky feature.

When you open an app that wants your location info for the first time, you
see a pop-up asking for permission. This pop-up, complete with a mini-map
preview of your location, is familiar to anyone on Android.

What isn't overtly clear here, however, is the Precise toggle hidden in the
mini map, which is set to "On" by default. If you want to disable it from
the onset, you'll need to toggle it off here before choosing the main
location setting on the pop-up.

It's not too late to fix the problem if you granted these permissions
already, though. You can manage precise location settings on any Android
device running Android 12 and newer.

While you're at it, make sure to review all location settings for your
Google Account.
https://lifehacker.com/how-to-turn-off-location-tracking-for-your-google-accou-1847562953

Am 28.08.22 um 16:56 schrieb NewsKrawler:
> https://lifehacker.com/precise-location-is-giving-your-coordinates-away-to-app-1849458216
> Your phone is broadcasting your exact location to apps that don't need it.
>
> Unless you routinely tweak your privacy settings, it's likely you're
> broadcasting your exact location to any app that wants it.
>
> The issue here is more related to privacy than security.
> Keeping precise location disabled for most apps is good privacy practice.

To disable GPS when it is not needed is even better and grant access to
location data only for those apps that really need it and when they are
used.

--
Gutta cavat lapidem (Ovid)

Joerg Lorenz used his or her keyboard to write :

> To disable GPS when it is not needed is even better and grant access to
> location data only for those apps that really need it and when they are
> used.

There are apps which require location data that don't really need it.

Talkatone comes to mind.

You have to grant Talkatone location data for the app to work, but there is
no need to give it precise location data for them to sell to others.

There are others.

Am 29.08.22 um 01:44 schrieb FromTheRafters:
> Joerg Lorenz used his or her keyboard to write :
>
>> To disable GPS when it is not needed is even better and grant access to
>> location data only for those apps that really need it and when they are
>> used.
>
> There are apps which require location data that don't really need it.
>
> Talkatone comes to mind.
>
> You have to grant Talkatone location data for the app to work, but there is
> no need to give it precise location data for them to sell to others.
>
> There are others.

I use iPhones since 2008. I never had apps on them that did not work
despite they asked for location data and I didn't allow it. 95% of the
time I turn off GPS. No unwanted collateral effects.

--
Gutta cavat lapidem (Ovid)

On 28/08/2022 15:56, NewsKrawler wrote:
> https://lifehacker.com/precise-location-is-giving-your-coordinates-away-to-app-1849458216
> Your phone is broadcasting your exact location to apps that don't need it.
>
> Unless you routinely tweak your privacy settings, it's likely you're
> broadcasting your exact location to any app that wants it.
>
> The issue here is more related to privacy than security.
> Keeping precise location disabled for most apps is good privacy practice.
>
> By keeping precise location on, you're sharing your exact location with any
> company that's interested (and they're all interested).

But do you know what to turn off? I thought I'd turned off what I could
on my Android 11 phone (now updated to 12), when by chance I came across
the Fused Location app. If it wasn't for the strange name I would
probably have missed it. What does it do? See here:
<https://droidrant.com/what-is-fused-location-on-android/>

And that's just one of Google's system apps which pass your location to
all and sundry. I can't appear to disable it on my Xiaomi phone. I don't
know what other system apps are leaking my location. I turned off, where
possible, all apps with "location" in their name, but what if they don't
have that obvious wording?

I guess that rooting and/or changing to Lineage would be one way to be
fairly sure, but note my use of "fairly sure".

--

Jeff

Joerg Lorenz used his or her keyboard to write :

> I use iPhones since 2008. I never had apps on them that did not work
> despite they asked for location data and I didn't allow it. 95% of the
> time I turn off GPS. No unwanted collateral effects.

It has been Google Android policy that certain wifi apps REQUIRE GPS.
Those apps won't work without GPS even though the app doesn't need GPS.

On Mon, 29 Aug 2022 at 08:00:49, Jeff Layman <Jeff@invalid.invalid> wrote:
(my responses usually follow points raised):
> I can't appear to disable it on my Xiaomi phone.

I found com.android.location.fused but it would not uninstall.
I couldn't turn off location permission for Fused Location either.
Seems to use android.permission.WRITE_SECURE_SETTINGS FusedLocationService.

Even though in App Info I just now set Remove permissions if app is unused.
Use Details = Optimized (versus Restricted or Unrestricted)

Source Directory = /system/priv-app/FusedLocation
Data Directory = /data/user_de/0/com.android.location.fused
Device-protected Data Directory = /data/user_de/0/com.android.location.fused

In Settings App Info you can Force Stop Fused Locataion.
But unfortunately the next reboot restarted it.

Google Maps still shows me where I am even with Fused Location stopped.

I don't know what the negative repercussions may be as I only did it after
seeing you describe the concept of a fused location (whatever that means).

What happens when you force stopped your fused location service?

Joerg Lorenz <hugybear@gmx.ch> wrote:

> I use iPhones since 2008.

This is an Android newsgroup.

Am 29.08.22 um 09:31 schrieb Rudolph Rhein:
> Joerg Lorenz <hugybear@gmx.ch> wrote:
>
>> I use iPhones since 2008.
>
> This is an Android newsgroup.

You are an uninformed Troll.
The OP posted the link in both groups.
And btw it applies to my Pixel 4 as well.

--
Gutta cavat lapidem (Ovid)

J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:

> the concept of a fused location (whatever that means)

It's google's method of combining multiple sources of location data (GPS,
cell-tower, wifi triangulation, bluetooth beacons if they still exist?) and
controlling how frequently apps are allowed to request location, so the phone
synchronises all their requests and minimises the amount of energy spent getting
the phone's location, if nothing is requesting precise location, it will only
get coarse location.

On 29/08/2022 08:26, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:
> On Mon, 29 Aug 2022 at 08:00:49, Jeff Layman <Jeff@invalid.invalid> wrote:
> (my responses usually follow points raised):
>> I can't appear to disable it on my Xiaomi phone.
>
> I found com.android.location.fused but it would not uninstall.
> I couldn't turn off location permission for Fused Location either.
> Seems to use android.permission.WRITE_SECURE_SETTINGS FusedLocationService.
>
> Even though in App Info I just now set Remove permissions if app is unused.
> Use Details = Optimized (versus Restricted or Unrestricted)
>
> Source Directory = /system/priv-app/FusedLocation
> Data Directory = /data/user_de/0/com.android.location.fused
> Device-protected Data Directory = /data/user_de/0/com.android.location.fused
>
> In Settings App Info you can Force Stop Fused Locataion.
> But unfortunately the next reboot restarted it.

Did you mean reboot or simply switch the phone on after switching it
off? I think that's pretty standard for a forced stop. If you're allowed
to do that, why isn't it possible to "permanently" disable a system app
until you require it again.

> Google Maps still shows me where I am even with Fused Location stopped.

I am not at all surprised. Sometimes I wonder just how many ways Google
can monitor your location without you knowing.

> I don't know what the negative repercussions may be as I only did it after
> seeing you describe the concept of a fused location (whatever that means).
>
> What happens when you force stopped your fused location service?

Nothing as far as I know as I didn't use anything which requires
location on my phone, and I probably restarted the phone in the interim
and so restarted that service. I also see that it's possible to delete
the 10MB of data stored from the app, but I'm not sure of the consequences.

--

Jeff

Joerg Lorenz <hugybear@gmx.ch> wrote:

> The OP posted the link in both groups.

This is an Android group.

If the op multi posted then put your iPhone garbage in their group.

Am 29.08.22 um 17:06 schrieb Rudolph Rhein:
> Joerg Lorenz <hugybear@gmx.ch> wrote:
>
>> The OP posted the link in both groups.
>
> This is an Android group.
>
> If the op multi posted then put your iPhone garbage in their group.

What others do or don't is none of your business.
Killfile me immediately. Your whining is deplorable and sucks.

--
Gutta cavat lapidem (Ovid)

On Mon, 29 Aug 2022 at 17:07:31, Jeff Layman <Jeff@invalid.invalid> wrote:
(my responses usually follow points raised):
>> In Settings App Info you can Force Stop Fused Locataion.
>> But unfortunately the next reboot restarted it.
>
> Did you mean reboot or simply switch the phone on after switching it
> off?

I used restart, not power off.

> I think that's pretty standard for a forced stop.

If restart would have kept the forced stopped fused location, then I would
have tried the power off but the forced stop didn't survive the restart.

> If you're allowed
> to do that, why isn't it possible to "permanently" disable a system app
> until you require it again.

I think some services respect the forced stop after rebooting.
I can check which ones do that but I'm pretty sure some do & some don't.

>> Google Maps still shows me where I am even with Fused Location stopped.
>
> I am not at all surprised.

Since there's no harm in disabling services, I disable those I don't need.
Example: Market Feedback Agent com.google.android.feedback is disabled.

Every once in a while I look to see which services are sending data.
Then I do what I can to stop them (uninstall, disable, force stop).

I only do one at a time in case there are negative repercussions in use.
Most of the time (nine out of ten seemingly) I don't notice anything.

But that's why I asked if there are negative consequences to stopping the
fused location service because I only did it to reproduce your observation.

> Sometimes I wonder just how many ways Google
> can monitor your location without you knowing.

Running a search, I found this which has no permissions allowed.
Google Location History com.google.android.gms.location.history
Source Directory = /product/app/GoogleLocationHistory
Data Directory = /data/user/0/com.google.android.gms.location.history
Device-protected Data Directory = same as the Data Directory

It wouldn't uninstall, but a force stop survived both restart & reboot.
I'll let you know if there are any negative repercussions over time.

Any idea what the difference is between "Disable" and "Force stop?"

>> I don't know what the negative repercussions may be as I only did it after
>> seeing you describe the concept of a fused location (whatever that means).
>>
>> What happens when you force stopped your fused location service?
>
> Nothing as far as I know as I didn't use anything which requires
> location on my phone, and I probably restarted the phone in the interim
> and so restarted that service.

I would guess that sometimes it may stop Google and sometimes it won't.

I also turned off Allow background data usage.
I also turned off Allow data usage while Data saver is on.
And just in case, I turned on Remove permissions if app is unused.
And also just in case, I turned off Open supported links.
And I pressed the Clear defaults button.

> I also see that it's possible to delete
> the 10MB of data stored from the app, but I'm not sure of the consequences.

I habitually delete the App, Data, and Cache of any google service I find.
I just did that for the Google Location History found in the above search.

What do you think I lose by not having Google Location History anymore?

On Mon, 29 Aug 2022 at 11:27:47, Andy Burns <usenet@andyburns.uk> wrote:
(my responses usually follow points raised):
> J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:
>
>> the concept of a fused location (whatever that means)
>
> It's google's method of combining multiple sources of location data (GPS,
> cell-tower, wifi triangulation, bluetooth beacons if they still exist?) and
> controlling how frequently apps are allowed to request location, so the phone
> synchronises all their requests and minimises the amount of energy spent getting
> the phone's location, if nothing is requesting precise location, it will only
> get coarse location.

The apps can triangulate on cell tower location?
How do they know where cell towers are when you can't see three at once?

More important, can you expand on the explanation now that I've forced
stopped fused location services as a result of reading this topic?

I only use GPS location because it's good enough & I don't need precision.
Even GPS I rarely use except when I'm lost and I need to bring up maps.
Which is like once every few months if that because I don't travel much.

Is there a negative to having fused location stopped in that situation?

J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:

> The apps can triangulate on cell tower location? How do they know where cell > towers are when you can't see three at once?
I didn't say the phones triangulate on cell tower, I said triangulate on wifi.

The cell towers can triangulate a phone, but that's a network function, not a
phone function.

But the phone does know what cell tower it is connected to, and what others it
can see, and there of plenty of databases of locations for them, I presume
google has one.

> More important, can you expand on the explanation now that I've forced
> stopped fused location services as a result of reading this topic?

Think of it as a phone-wide "controller" of location services, it enables
various sources of location data, receives the actual location updates from
them, and controls how often and how precisely apps can request location data.

> I only use GPS location because it's good enough & I don't need precision.

GPS is the *most* precise location service.

> Even GPS I rarely use except when I'm lost and I need to bring up maps.
> Which is like once every few months if that because I don't travel much.
>
> Is there a negative to having fused location stopped in that situation?

No idea, I've never tried to stop it.

J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:

> Any idea what the difference is between "Disable" and "Force stop?"

The former should continue to take effect after a reboot, the latter only stops
it for now, anything else could restart it, including a reboot.

FromTheRafters <erratic@nomail.afraid.org> wrote:
> Joerg Lorenz used his or her keyboard to write :
>
> > I use iPhones since 2008. I never had apps on them that did not work
> > despite they asked for location data and I didn't allow it. 95% of the
> > time I turn off GPS. No unwanted collateral effects.
>
> It has been Google Android policy that certain wifi apps REQUIRE GPS.
> Those apps won't work without GPS even though the app doesn't need GPS.

Maybe you're right, but I think you mean "certain *Bluetooth* apps
require the *location permission*". (I.e., not Wi-Fi, but Bluetooth, and
not GPS, but location permission.)

For example, most COVID-tracking apps needed location permission in
order to be able to use Bluetooth proximity monitoring. (Our Dutch/NL
one did, but has been shut off because it's no longr needed (ATM).)

In article <tej5if.9uk.1@ID-201911.user.individual.net>, Frank Slootweg
<this@ddress.is.invalid> wrote:

>
> For example, most COVID-tracking apps needed location permission in
> order to be able to use Bluetooth proximity monitoring.

those weren't using the apple/google system, which was deliberately
designed to *not* use location, which is not a requirement for
bluetooth proximity.

nospam <nospam@nospam.invalid> wrote:
> In article <tej5if.9uk.1@ID-201911.user.individual.net>, Frank Slootweg
> <this@ddress.is.invalid> wrote:
>
> >
> > For example, most COVID-tracking apps needed location permission in
> > order to be able to use Bluetooth proximity monitoring.
>
> those weren't using the apple/google system, which was deliberately
> designed to *not* use location, which is not a requirement for
> bluetooth proximity.

Yes, they did. The limitation was (is?) an Android limitation, at
least in Android 10. As you say, they did not use *location*, but the
Bluetooth proximity mechanism (on *Android*) needed location
*permission*.

In article <tej6le.6tk.1@ID-201911.user.individual.net>, Frank Slootweg
<this@ddress.is.invalid> wrote:

> > >
> > > For example, most COVID-tracking apps needed location permission in
> > > order to be able to use Bluetooth proximity monitoring.
> >
> > those weren't using the apple/google system, which was deliberately
> > designed to *not* use location, which is not a requirement for
> > bluetooth proximity.
>
> Yes, they did. The limitation was (is?) an Android limitation, at
> least in Android 10. As you say, they did not use *location*, but the
> Bluetooth proximity mechanism (on *Android*) needed location
> *permission*.

true for android 10, but that was released before covid, in september
2019. android 11 was released in september 2020. however, most android
users don't upgrade that quickly (often because they can't).

the apple/google system came out in mid-2020 with apps following after
that, although the uptake was far slower than it should have been
because many entities wanted location data, which the apple/google
system did not provide, by design.

note that the apple/google system was based on work done at mit, led by
ron rivest, the 'r' in rsa encryption.

nospam <nospam@nospam.invalid> wrote:
> In article <tej6le.6tk.1@ID-201911.user.individual.net>, Frank Slootweg
> <this@ddress.is.invalid> wrote:
>
> > > >
> > > > For example, most COVID-tracking apps needed location permission in
> > > > order to be able to use Bluetooth proximity monitoring.
> > >
> > > those weren't using the apple/google system, which was deliberately
> > > designed to *not* use location, which is not a requirement for
> > > bluetooth proximity.
> >
> > Yes, they did. The limitation was (is?) an Android limitation, at
> > least in Android 10. As you say, they did not use *location*, but the
> > Bluetooth proximity mechanism (on *Android*) needed location
> > *permission*.
>
> true for android 10, but that was released before covid, in september
> 2019. android 11 was released in september 2020. however, most android
> users don't upgrade that quickly (often because they can't).

Moot point, because the apps needed to support as many devices as
possible, i.e. also all older Android versions for which the
Google/Apple framework was available. AFAIR, that was as 'old' as
Android 7, but I can verify, because that information is no longer on
the Dutch/NL app's site (and Google Play fscked up its information).

> the apple/google system came out in mid-2020 with apps following after
> that, although the uptake was far slower than it should have been
> because many entities wanted location data, which the apple/google
> system did not provide, by design.

Our app came out in the summer of 2020. (Google Play reviews start as
early as August 16).

Frank Slootweg used his or her keyboard to write :

> Maybe you're right, but I think you mean "certain *Bluetooth* apps
> require the *location permission*". (I.e., not Wi-Fi, but Bluetooth, and
> not GPS, but location permission.)

I am sure I am right but not for that Bluetooth reason, which is probably
another reason that Joerg guy was wrong about apps requiring location
permission because google required them to require it but which didn't need
location permission to work.

This requirement for location to be required even for apps that didn't need
location started somewhere back around two or three Android versions ago
Google decided to "do something" about apps being able to figure out where
you are by the wifi access points near you.

Instead of actually doing something about that, google changed the policy
that all the third-party apps that got a wifi access point had to require
gps location permission.

Google's explanation made no sense and we can look it up to see what they
said exactly but their explanation was that people didn't realize they
could be tracked by wifi access points so google wanted them to accept gps
tracking so that they'd be sure to know they could be tracked.

If you don't believe that cockeamamie explanation, I wouldn't be surprised
but if you don't believe me that that is what google said we can look it
up.

It's only in Android 13 that Google finally did the first thing real about
stopping this crazy practice of making your location more easily found by
requiring gps just so that google would be sure that you knew that your
location could be found by a wifi app.

If the same situation exists with bluetooth apps requiring gps when they
don't need them, then that would just be more of the same google craziness.

Am 29.08.22 um 22:25 schrieb FromTheRafters:
> Instead of actually doing something about that, google changed the policy
> that all the third-party apps that got a wifi access point had to require
> gps location permission.

I hardly ever use GPS on my Pixel 4 with Android 13 and didn't with 11
or 12 neither. Despite that all apps work as intended except those which
are functionally based on location data like maps for instance. Public
transport apps do not belong to this group.

The same applies to Bluetooth. Only used to connect to specific
hardware. No problems. I have no intention to feed BT-beacons without
consent.

Are you trying to spread FUD?

--
Gutta cavat lapidem (Ovid)

Joerg Lorenz wrote:

> FromTheRafters wrote:
>
>> google changed the policy that all the third-party apps that got a wifi
>> access point had to require gps location permission.
>
> Are you trying to spread FUD?

Yesterday, I installed a newer version of "Fing" on a different device where I
haven't used it before, it did pop up a warning that location access was
required to use wifi features, it allows continuing without location access, but
with reduced functionality ... so I'd say it's not FUD.