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Apple Announces New Privacy-Enhancing Techniques in iOS 8

Apple has announced new privacy-enhancing techniques that will limit the ability of third parties to track Apple mobile devicesi. Specifically, iOS8 will use "random, locally administered MAC addresses," instead of unique device IDs, to connect to the Internet. Mobile phones can now be tracked by law enforcement and private companies because of the unique MAC address associated with the device. In 2004 when the adoption of IPv6 raised privacy concerns, EPIC recommended that MAC addresses be randomized to avoid tracking. The change in the Apple iOS implements this proposal. For more information, see EPIC: Practical Privacy Tools and EPIC: Location Privacy.


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