Social apps come in for scrutiny.
Apple has responded to outcry regarding the social app
Path and its gathering of address book information. This app gathered necessary information from iPhones and uploaded the contents of address books to its servers. This is a practice which Apple states is in violation of its guidelines if users have not given permission. Apps will soon require explicit user permission to access address books as part of a future software upgrade.
Path’s CEO,
Dave Morin, had to apologise and promise a change of practice after it was discovered that address books were being accessed. Singapore-based software developer
Arun Thampi monitored API calls made to Path's servers from the iPhone app and realised that this practice was ongoing. Apple has said that this practice is not allowed and is set to protect users. The company said, ""We're working to make this even better for our customers, and as we have done with location services, any app wishing to access contact data will require explicit user approval in a future software release."