Location Tracking in Windows 7

Microsoft recently announced the Windows Sensor and Location Platform, a component of the next release of the Windows operating system that allows applications to access sensors, including location sensors. Tracking a user's location, and sharing that information with any application that requests it, carries serious privacy concerns. Other tools, such as Mozilla Geode, allay some of these concerns by giving the user control over whether and how location information is shared with Web sites. Windows, unfortunately, does not currently provide such controls, forcing the user to choose between eschewing location-aware applications entirely and giving every application complete knowledge of her present location.

Windows, Location Information, and Privacy

The good news about the Sensor and Location Platform is that it is turned off by default: users must expressly activate the functionality in order to enable applications to determine their location. Requiring users to opt in before using private information is always a positive.

Unfortunately, users retain very little control over their location information if they do choose to share it with applications. Beyond the initial choice of enabling location information, users can limit access to visibly running programs and prevent hidden services from accessing location information.

But that's it. Users cannot allow only specific applications to access location information, ostensibly because Windows cannot always reliably identify applications. While it is true that malicious software could pretend to be a trusted application, there is no good reason to take away this option entirely simply because it might rarely be circumvented. Moreover, users cannot configure the location platform to notify them when an application requests or receives location information, even though the Windows 7 program manager acknowledged that doing so is technically possible. Users also lack any additional control over their location information, such as choosing only to reveal their city or zip code rather than precise location.

Windows Users Must Demand Privacy

Fortunately, "the only real saving grace is that Window 7 remains in the active development stage and there's no telling what the finished product will really look like." While the proposed location interface is sorely lacking in privacy protection, pushing Microsoft and other companies to recognize our right to control our location information can still change the final product features. If we show companies that they ignore privacy concerns at their own peril, they will listen to our demands.

The lack of privacy surrounding location information in Windows 7 is disconcerting on deeper levels, as it illustrates that companies presume that users don't really care about privacy. We encourage you to prove them wrong. Contact Microsoft and demand control over your location information, not the inadequate safeguards currently proposed for the next generation of Windows.

Chris Conley is the Technology and Civil Liberties Fellow with the ACLU of Northern California.