27,000 South Koreans sue Apple over location data storing

Cupertino: "Zoom in... enhance..."
Cupertino: "Zoom in... enhance..."

One South Korean law firm is representing 27,000 citizens all looking for compensation from Apple over Big Brother style location data storage found in iOS 4 devices.

You may recall that back in April quite the fuss was kicked up when it emerged that the iPhone was secretly and unencryptedly storing data about where it had been and when.

Kim Hyung-souk successfully managed to eke £565 of compensation out of Apple when he sued the company in a South Korean court over the privacy infringement; now he's helping 27,000 others do the same.

Another day in court

Hyung-souk explained, "I'm an iPhone user myself, so when I first heard about this in the media, I reviewed the legality of the matter based on Korean law. I concluded that it was clearly illegal."

If each and every one of the 27,000 claimants he is now representing wins their case against Apple, it could cost the technology giant around £15 million in compensation, not to mention court costs.

During the great PR disaster of April 2011, Apple claimed that it was "maintaining a database of Wi-Fi hotspots and cell towers" and not tracking your iPhone's every move.

It has since released a software update that ensured that the location-storing cache is deleted every time the device's location services are turned off.

From The Telegraph

News Editor (UK)

Former UK News Editor for TechRadar, it was a perpetual challenge among the TechRadar staff to send Kate (Twitter, Google+) a link to something interesting on the internet that she hasn't already seen. As TechRadar's News Editor (UK), she was constantly on the hunt for top news and intriguing stories to feed your gadget lust. Kate now enjoys life as a renowned music critic – her words can be found in the i Paper, Guardian, GQ, Metro, Evening Standard and Time Out, and she's also the author of 'Amy Winehouse', a biography of the soul star.

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