A SECURITY expert has claimed some apps aren’t worth having on your phone if you’re worried about location privacy.
Tech expert Carey Parker is the author of a book called Firewalls Don’t Stop Dragons: A Step-by-Step Guide to Computer Security and Privacy for Non-Techies.
He previously revealed to She Finds that weather apps aren’t always as useful as they seem.
Parker told the publication: “There are actually a ton of horrible apps for privacy, particularly on Android.
“Apps that need your location to do their job are bad about selling your location to others, like the Weather App.”
The expert isn’t alone with this claim, earlier this month Kaspersky researchers also flagged weather apps as potentially problematic when it comes to location data.
According to a recent post from Stan Kaminsky, a security expert at Kaspersky, some apps can track us via geolocation.
Geolocation is just the process of using digital data processed online to determine where somebody is.
The Kaspersky post states: “Weather apps and other seemingly harmless programs you use on day-to-day basis do it systematically.
“What we suggest everyone should do is one simple yet important thing: minimize the number of apps that have access to your location.
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“After all, you can choose a place manually to get a weather forecast, and entering a delivery address when shopping online is not that big a deal.”
It’s not necessarily harmful for an app to collect your data but sometimes personal information can be leaked so it’s worth being selective about who you give it to.
Go through your apps and change their permissions if you think they’re accessing your location when they don’t need to.
You may also want to delete some apps that request access to a suspicious amount of features on your phone.
Deleting weather apps can also give your phone a quick battery boost.
They usually run in the background which can drain your battery faster.
