MoviePass CEO says the app tracks your location before and after movies

Re:MoviePass CEO says the app tracks your location before an... by jnnnthnn on Monday March 05, 2018 @05:41PM (#16525243)

One thing that is clever about MoviePass, is that in order to use their membership, one must have location services activated at least for a brief instant every time they are going to the movie. Indeed, you need to “check in” in the app when you’re within a 100 yard radius of the theater in order to be able to charge the ticket price to the MoviePass-provided payment card. Odds are, most people won’t want (or remember) to turn location services on and off every time they purchase a ticket.

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Re:MoviePass CEO says the app tracks your location before an... by ChadMoran on Monday March 05, 2018 @05:55PM (#16525322)

iOS 11 introduced the ability to allow apps to only access your location while you're actively using the app. Using this method should be a good mitigation.

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Re:MoviePass CEO says the app tracks your location before an... by theklr on Monday March 05, 2018 @06:00PM (#16525354)

Unfortunately apps don’t care. Waze lingers up to 40 minute after traveling in the background and that’s with supposed in app only mode.

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Re:MoviePass CEO says the app tracks your location before an... by cityzen on Monday March 05, 2018 @06:43PM (#16525640)

From Apple: "When Location Services is active, a black or white arrow icon appears in the status bar."

If Waze is using it for up to 40 minutes after traveling, you need to decide if you want to know where the cops are or if you want Google to know where you are.

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Re:MoviePass CEO says the app tracks your location before an... by dothis9 on Monday March 05, 2018 @07:33PM (#16525901)

The colored location bar on top stays active too.

I always force quit Waze at the end of the trip so that it (1) stops tracking me and (2) I don't waste my phone's battery life on tracking me

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Re:MoviePass CEO says the app tracks your location before an... by ChadMoran on Monday March 05, 2018 @06:22PM (#16525498)

Unless I'm mistaken they don't have access to your location while running in the background. Running != access to location.

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Re:MoviePass CEO says the app tracks your location before an... by dannyw on Monday March 05, 2018 @08:43PM (#16526243)

GPS mapping apps can enter into an “active backgrounder” mode, where the app is active in the background.

It is one of the few app categories that can do that; the other is VOIP.

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Re:MoviePass CEO says the app tracks your location before an... by ikurei on Tuesday March 06, 2018 @04:57AM (#16527908)

But doesn't the status bar remain green while an app is doing that?

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Re:MoviePass CEO says the app tracks your location before an... by fitzroy on Tuesday March 06, 2018 @12:26AM (#16527065)

Mine is clearly set to only "While Using" on iOS 11.

I don't see why it's surprising that MoviePass tracks your location when you open the app to look up movies or check in. Would that not be obvious?

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Re:MoviePass CEO says the app tracks your location before an... by sixothree on Monday March 05, 2018 @07:01PM (#16525752)

I find that I often check the movie times using the application from my house or my office. I'm sure it captures that brief window as well.

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Re:MoviePass CEO says the app tracks your location before an... by l9k on Monday March 05, 2018 @06:12PM (#16525443)

With the Android app I was able to check in from more than a mile away (multiple times)

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