Apple compensates for location tracking

Apple’s South Korean unit has compensated a local smartphone user for damage he suffered from the company’s illicit collection of location data, a lawyer said Wednesday. According to Kim Hyeong-seok, the user filed a 1 million won ($943) compensation suit against Apple Korea on April 26 following reports that the U.S. tech giant had traced phone and tablet users and stored their location data. The Changwon District Court ruled that Apple should pay the money to Kim and the firm didn’t appeal, which means that it admitted to the charges, the lawyer said. He added that Apple Korea remitted 998,000 won to his bank account last month after deducting 2,000 won in remittance charges. “Apple’s collection of location information in an unauthorized manner breached the Constitution and is a violation of the privacy of users,” Kim said. The court ruling and the firm’s payment could trigger a wave of similar lawsuits here. The number of iPhone users has surpassed 3 million. In April, Apple and Google were criticized for storing geo-positioning information of smartphone users, with Wall Street saying iPhone and Google’s Android regularly transmitted their location-tracking information to each other. In Korea, a total of 29 iPhone users have filed compensation suits against Apple and Apple Korea.

Apple should sue these people for being so stupid