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I am about to delete Google Maps on my iPhone. Are all those issues valid on an iPhone as well or does Apple limit it‘s privacy evading features? Edit: Done.

I am about to delete Google Maps on my iPhone. Are all those issues valid on an iPhone as well or does Apple limit it‘s privacy evading features? Edit: Done. Deleted it. Now if only I had an alternative to Garmin Connect. Love my fitness watch (Garmin Fenix), but hate the way they collect data about me. And no alternative.

kohtatsu 6y ago
Explore the Privacy section of the Settingd app to find out.
mnd999 6y ago
I did this and I don't miss it. Apple Maps is good enough these days.
- izacus 6y ago
  Apple Maps of course collects a lot of the exact same data (make sure you double check their settings. But you could always disable location history for Google Maps as well.)
  - prepend 6y ago
    Apple Maps doesn’t sell that data to advertisers. And they collect much less than Google.
    - izacus 6y ago
      Last I checked Google didn't sell data to anyone either. I'm also interested in the claim that Apple Maps collects less data in this respect - they both report your current location for traffic analysis and have your day-to-day movement option available (the same that powers Find My Friends on iOS). Are you sure you're just not rationalizing Apples collection? It's kinda important to be realistic when it comes to privacy and not be mislead by loud marketing.
      - kortilla 6y ago
        > Last I checked Google didn't sell data to anyone either. If they allow advertising based on constraints on that data, they are selling it, albeit indirectly.
        prepend 6y ago
        This is what I meant by selling data. The only data I know of that they sell directly is to NSA where they provide access to data and get money for it. They are largely compelled to do this though and I expect anyone in the US with data would be forced to as well. Interestingly since google could deanonymize if they wanted, I wonder if nowadays NSA is just sucking in all our profiles from google and then deanonymizing to have de facto profiles on every human on the planet.
      - gpanders 6y ago
        IIRC the only data sent to Apple is the crowdsourced traffic data, which can be disabled. Everything else stays on device or is E2E encrypted.
      - mthoms 6y ago
        On iPhone your location history (they call it Significant Locations) is "end-to-end encrypted and cannot be read be Apple". There's still the "Product Improvement > Routing and Traffic" toggle (enabled by default) but I'd be surprised if this isn't anonymized and/or scrubbed frequently.
- secondcoming 6y ago
  HERE maps are quite good and allow you to download maps on to your device (maybe they all offer that?). I used it when driving from London to Edinburgh.
FirstLvR 6y ago
all google apps tracks you, even using google news does not help
JimDabell 6y ago
> Are all those issues valid on an iPhone as well or does Apple limit it‘s privacy evading features? Most of them are valid on iOS as well, however if you go to Settings > Google Maps > Location and pick “While Using the App”, Google will only be able to track your location while you have the application open, so they can’t track everywhere you go as described in #3.
chewz 6y ago
Try OpenTracks from F-Droid. And Mapy.cz is quite decent Maps replacement. Acctually better for outdoor activity like cycling and jogging.
dmortin 6y ago
> I am about to delete Google Maps You could just turn off location history in the settings.
- prepend 6y ago
  I did this but it’s annoying because there are limited features with it off. And Maps bugs me every time to turn it off, there’s no way for me to decline forever or note my preference. So it’s like having pop up ads. The limited functionality is also frustrating as you can’t even save locations with search history turned off. Google Maps product designers don’t care about good UX, they care about collecting data from users. They explicitly design bad interfaces into their products to drive behavior.
pferde 6y ago
Have you tried https://github.com/SamR1/FitTrackee https://github.com/SamR1/FitTrackee ?

kohtatsu 6y ago

Explore the Privacy section of the Settingd app to find out.

mnd999 6y ago

I did this and I don't miss it. Apple Maps is good enough these days.

izacus 6y ago
Apple Maps of course collects a lot of the exact same data (make sure you double check their settings. But you could always disable location history for Google Maps as well.)
- prepend 6y ago
  Apple Maps doesn’t sell that data to advertisers. And they collect much less than Google.
  - izacus 6y ago
    Last I checked Google didn't sell data to anyone either. I'm also interested in the claim that Apple Maps collects less data in this respect - they both report your current location for traffic analysis and have your day-to-day movement option available (the same that powers Find My Friends on iOS). Are you sure you're just not rationalizing Apples collection? It's kinda important to be realistic when it comes to privacy and not be mislead by loud marketing.
    - kortilla 6y ago
      > Last I checked Google didn't sell data to anyone either. If they allow advertising based on constraints on that data, they are selling it, albeit indirectly.
      - prepend 6y ago
        This is what I meant by selling data. The only data I know of that they sell directly is to NSA where they provide access to data and get money for it. They are largely compelled to do this though and I expect anyone in the US with data would be forced to as well. Interestingly since google could deanonymize if they wanted, I wonder if nowadays NSA is just sucking in all our profiles from google and then deanonymizing to have de facto profiles on every human on the planet.
    - gpanders 6y ago
      IIRC the only data sent to Apple is the crowdsourced traffic data, which can be disabled. Everything else stays on device or is E2E encrypted.
    - mthoms 6y ago
      On iPhone your location history (they call it Significant Locations) is "end-to-end encrypted and cannot be read be Apple". There's still the "Product Improvement > Routing and Traffic" toggle (enabled by default) but I'd be surprised if this isn't anonymized and/or scrubbed frequently.
secondcoming 6y ago
HERE maps are quite good and allow you to download maps on to your device (maybe they all offer that?). I used it when driving from London to Edinburgh.

FirstLvR 6y ago

all google apps tracks you, even using google news does not help

JimDabell 6y ago

> Are all those issues valid on an iPhone as well or does Apple limit it‘s privacy evading features? Most of them are valid on iOS as well, however if you go to Settings > Google Maps > Location and pick “While Using the App”, Google will only be able to track your location while you have the application open, so they can’t track everywhere you go as described in #3.

chewz 6y ago

Try OpenTracks from F-Droid. And Mapy.cz is quite decent Maps replacement. Acctually better for outdoor activity like cycling and jogging.

dmortin 6y ago

> I am about to delete Google Maps You could just turn off location history in the settings.

prepend 6y ago
I did this but it’s annoying because there are limited features with it off. And Maps bugs me every time to turn it off, there’s no way for me to decline forever or note my preference. So it’s like having pop up ads. The limited functionality is also frustrating as you can’t even save locations with search history turned off. Google Maps product designers don’t care about good UX, they care about collecting data from users. They explicitly design bad interfaces into their products to drive behavior.

pferde 6y ago

Have you tried https://github.com/SamR1/FitTrackee https://github.com/SamR1/FitTrackee ?