Nick Bilton
Another day, another creepy mobile app. Here is one that allows you to find women in your area. It definitely wins the prize for too creepy.
Girls Around Me uses Foursquare, the location-based mobile service, to determine your location. It then scans for women in the area who have recently checked-in on the service. Once you identify a woman you’d like to talk to, one that inevitably has no idea you’re snooping on her, you can connect to her through Facebook, see her full name, profile photos and send her a message.
When you sign up for the Girls Around Me application, you are asked to log in to Facebook, giving the service your personal information, too. After connecting to Facebook, the app asks for everything, requiring people to share their basic information, profile information, photos, information people share with them and e-mail address. It will also ask permission to access your data when you are not using the app and post status updates, photos and more on your behalf.
“This would be a very different application if it didn’t link back to Facebook, which is the treasure trove of information. With that link, this app could easily be a “let’s stalk women” app,” said Elizabeth Stark, a lecturer in law at Stanford who teaches about privacy on the Internet.
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Well good. This gives people something to think about, regarding their personal information.
Consider that Facebook, Google, AT&T, Verizon and others may be using personal info in an equally nefarious way.
The difference is this app shows the modus operandi of information mining in stark clarity.
Lol. Sounds like there’s consent by the female users.
Creepy? Based on design facts, I disagree, I’d call it useful.
I’m not all that e-social tho, so this is N/A.