ms mac consulting

Did everyone hear about it? There’s a file in your iPhone that can store your location. Many many people are writing about it, are up in arms about it, have different reasons to be upset.

It’s called Location Services, you can find the on/off switch in your General Control panel. You know how when you use an App to check in and it knows where you are? Location Services. Or you turn on Google Maps and there it is, that red pin showing you WHERE YOU ARE RIGHT NOW! Location Services!

So what is all the yelling about?

I personally got inundated by articles about it all. I read the researchers “concern” about the open unencrypted file IN YOUR OWN PHONE that people: a spouse, ex-girlfriend, researchers, can use to TRACK YOU! We won’t mention that if you have Location Services turned on you are likely to also be playing Four Square on Facebook, and the stranger you said yes to as an innocent friend request already knows where you’ve been.  Of course since the researchers found out you can use that data to track where someone has been, and worried it was unencrypted, (a file open to the user who can get into the data section of someone elses iphone,) these two dudes told everyone about it and made up some free software to build a map out of the data as well, in case the spouse, ex-girlfriend, stalker didn’t know enough on their own how to interpret this info – look FREE TOOLS!  Sigh.

The sadly prosaic truth is computers and people who make programs for computers tend to save information.  Cache files, hard drive transfers, log lists of everything, including where location services has been.  Sometimes there’s a reason, sometimes there isn’t but even in my own computer life I have had one to many times when I wish a year later that I had recorded that one thing that didn’t seem important at the time. If, as a phone designer, you want to save time, memory, and battery you don’t have the file that is in use by MOST of the games you play (i have to deny turning location services on ALL the time when I play games) encrypted, or people will start screaming about performance of their phone.

The fact that you are using a cell phone, or the internet, should tell you that your privacy is not guaranteed.  Read all the Terms and Conditions you sign. You would have to jump off the e-bandwagon altogether to be sure you have the expectation of privacy, of course that’s just in your cyber life, check the Patriot Act for real life issues on the same subject.

Steve Jobs recently replied to the dust up via a short and to the point email reply

“Q: Steve,

Could you please explain the necessity of the passive location-tracking tool embedded in my iPhone? It’s kind of unnerving knowing that my exact location is being recorded at all times. Maybe you could shed some light on this for me before I switch to a Droid. They don’t track me.

A: Oh yes they do. We don’t track anyone. The info circulating around is false.”

Of course there is also the longer version of an answer that apple gave in reply to Al Franken’s demanding questions.

The whole things feels like political and media base showboating to me.

And really, how different is this from living in the small town where the grapevine has already told your momma what you were up to over at Chuck’s garage the other day?

In conclusion, you don’t want to have a file saving data on where you have been? Open Settings, General and turn Location Services to off.    It may change some of your App experiences for you on the phone but it may be worth your peace of mind.

If you have used Ms Mac Consulting in the past you may have met me, Marsha Brown.  I may have come to your home and helped fix your computer or kept your company humming along.  In all these years of doing this job I have notice one major thing while doing this service for you.  Fear gets in the way.

Our clients are smart, capable, and successful in a variety of areas but many are simply scared of their computer.  Scared they will hit the wrong button, scared something will happen and they will feel stupid or lose everything.  Usually this means someone has yelled at them in the past for not knowing what they are doing.  Other times it means they have the kind of brain that simply doesn’t translate well into the virtual world of cyber life. Part of why Ms Mac is your choice of computer support is that we understand this and simply don’t judge. We patiently work through the problems and train as we go and know that we are lucky in that computers make sense to us.

However, that scared feeling is how I feel about money and finances.

After years of this career and the freelancing money style I’ve put 1+1 together and realized I can make up a solution for everyone like me, who get frightened by money but love their iApps. No fear or anxiety in iPhone/iPad land right?  Simply tap the screen!  Or fling the bird!  Or roll that toilet paper down as fast as you can!  None of it hurts and there are lovely shiny cartoon rewards for doing it well.

I thought up my own game idea.  Play a game to enter your receipts.  Let it give you larger and smaller rewards for spending less and staying in budget.  See your data as cartoons so you know that the ginormous bloated category of eating out is bumping into the rent category and taking it over.  Have a nagging voice asking you do you really want to spend that there cause you only have this much budgeted and those shoes mean rice and beans for a week.  Basically, make a game that takes the fear and adds the fun to daily money tracking.

Luckily I have friends who design and program and at this point we are trying to bootstrap ourselves into a very real new company while concentrating on getting this game out.  If you love the idea check out the video and invest what you can at IndieGoGo: Wanna Play A Game?