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Posts: 359 | Thanked: 162 times | Joined on Jan 2011 @ Budapest
#5
I've looked on a couple of Android sites where this app is also available and you see pretty much unequivocal praise for how well this app works.. which proves two things:

(1) Android users tend to be sheep and download apps without reading ToS or thinking about the implications; on BOTH Ovi Store and My-Meego other users have warned about the ToS of this program and this is how I first learned of it

(2) If it really is working like people say (and praise it for) then it means they've already harvested a massive amount of data, because the chances of random people calling me and their details being already known to this company are quite small (vanishingly so) unless their database is really quite large already. I would think this database would be extremely valuable to nefarious business types that could have all sorts of unsavoury uses for it.

Further, it appears not only do they access all my friends and business contacts in my phone, but their ToS allows them to get any and all data they find there - so not only phone numbers (which is all they need for their app to work as advertised) but also street addresses, IM details, and so on - it's all right their in their ToS.

Even though it is in their Tos I would think that such a violation of privacy would require some sort of warning before you download their application, and so even if it is legal, the mere fact that it is in their ToS might not be a defence in a court of law. Their practice, arguably, amounts to a sort of deception because it is so unexpected.

I wrote to the company concerned (there is an email address on their website) and this is the reply I received (note the hastily composed English - is this company run by a teenager?):


From: Charbel Litany <charbel.litany@inmobiles.net>
Subject: Re: your terms and conditions
Date: 15 December, 2011 5:45:50 PM GMT+01:00

Hi,

We respect your opinion, u r free to do whatever u want.
At least we are warning ppl to share contacts so they have access to unknown callers.

Best regards
I don't think they are "warning ppl" as it is put here. An obscure paragraph at the end of a ToS most people will not bother to read, and which they know most people will not bother to read, is hardly a "warning".

Interestingly, the site is registered in Lebanon and appears to be operating out of Beirut. What should we make of that?

Last edited by noetus; 2011-12-16 at 13:26.
 

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