The research that we and our colleagues are doing identifies and explores a significant threat that most people miss: More than 70 percent of smartphone apps are reporting personal data to third-party tracking companies like Google Analytics, the Facebook Graph API or Crashlytics. When people install a new Android or iOS app, it asks the user's permission before accessing personal information. The app can send data elsewhere, too. As with websites, many mobile apps are written by combining various functions, precoded by other developers and companies, in what are called third-party libraries. For example, a person might give one app permission to know their location, and another app access to their contacts.

Source: The China Post May 30, 2017 09:45 UTC