Today, U.S. Sen. Al Franken (D-Minn.) released the following statement after reviewing the responses he received from Carrier IQ, AT&T, Sprint, Samsung, and HTC regarding Carrier IQ and the use of its software.
“I appreciate the responses I received, but I’m still very troubled by what’s going on,” said Sen. Franken. “People have a fundamental right to control their private information. After reading the companies’ responses, I’m still concerned that this right is not being respected. The average user of any device equipped with Carrier IQ software has no way of knowing that this software is running, what information it is getting, and who it is giving it to-and that’s a problem. It appears that Carrier IQ has been receiving the contents of a number of text messages-even though they had told the public that they did not. I’m also bothered by the software’s ability to capture the contents of our online searches-even when users wish to encrypt them. So there are still many questions to be answered here and things that need to be fixed.”
On December 1, Sen. Franken wrote a letter to Carrier IQ asking the company to explain what its software records, where it is transmitted, and who has access to it. Sen. Franken then wrote letters to AT&T, Sprint, Samsung, HTC, T-mobile, and Motorola, who had acknowledged that they used Carrier IQ’s software. Sen. Franken requested that they explain what they do with the information they receive from the software.
Earlier this year, Sen. Franken introduced the Location Privacy Protection Act, which would require companies like Connect IQ to obtain the explicit permission of customers before tracking their location information or sharing that information with third parties. The legislation has already garnered significant support in the Senate and from prominent privacy and consumer protection advocates.
Franken (D-Minn.) reached out to AT&T, HTC, Samsung, and Sprint Nextel after they acknowledged their use of Carrier IQ’s diagnostic software to request that they explain what they do with the information they receive from the software. Sen. Franken took action after learning from representatives of Carrier IQ—the software company recently accused of secretly logging location and private information from smartphones—that while Carrier IQ develops the software, it is subsequently modified and actually installed by carriers and handset manufacturers.
In his letter, Sen. Franken called on Carrier IQ President and CEO Larry Lenhart to explain exactly what information the software records, whether that information is transmitted to Carrier IQ or to other companies, and whether that information is shared with any third party, among other things. He also asked if Carrier IQ would allow users to stop this tracking.
“Consumers need to know that their privacy rights aren’t being violated by the companies they trust with their sensitive information,” said Sen. Franken. “While I understand and acknowledge the legitimate need for diagnostics software on smartphones, the data that Carrier IQ’s software appears to be logging is alarming. I want to hear from these companies exactly why they feel the need to install this software on their devices and what they’re doing with the information they’re gathering.”
Sen. Franken earlier this year was named chairman of the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Privacy, Technology & the Law. In May, he held the first hearing of that subcommittee, called Protecting Mobile Privacy: Your Smartphones, Tablets, Cell Phones and Your Privacy, during which he heard from representatives from Apple and Google, officials from the Department of Justice and the Federal Trade Commission, and technology experts. In September, Sen. Franken successfully called on OnStar to reverse its decision to track the locations of its customers and potentially sell that information to third parties.
