Android phones may be collecting 10 times as much personal data from their users as iOS devices do from Apple phone users, according to a new research.
Directed by computer science professor Douglas Schmidt, the research found that around two-thirds of the data Google collected or inferred from an Android user occurred in the background, when users were not notified that their data was being shared.
Even when an Android mobile was entirely stationary and idle over the course of 24 hours, the device still sent about 900 data samples to Google. More than a third of those samples contained location data.
On the other hand, the data sent from an idle iPhone to the Apple server was 10 times less frequent, according to the research published in trade association Digital Content Next.
Digital Content Next’s CEO Jason Kint said the study provided a comprehensive baseline understanding of just how much data Google is collecting from users across the internet and how it blends the data sources to fuel its lucrative advertising business.
In the first quarter of 2018, more than 85 percent of revenue at Alphabet, Google’s parent company, came from Google’s programmatic advertising services, according to company filings.
