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Comment by givinguflac | Hacker News Reader

iOS 13 actually has BT permissions per-app, and blocking that has no bearing on bt audio as that’s handled on the system level. It’s quite eye opening. Netflix for example wants access to BT even though there is absolutely no Netflix accessory that would warrant such access. I’m pretty thrilled about the change and it only cements my choice of iOS for me.

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That still won't change much, though, because, inevitably, there will be some app that requires Bluetooth for some fundamental aspect of its use that will also use one of these SDK's. Granting that app access to this will give it all the info it needs. What really needs to happen is that Apple needs to make some of these beacon-able permissions more granular. How to do that in a way that a tech-naive population understands what's happening is a very difficult problem to solve, though.

Which app types require permanent bluetooth access? Bearing in mind that connected to bluetooth audio is handled for apps by the system.

Not being snarky, genuinely unsure what would need this. You’re definitely right that a single app with permissions and the sdks would be enough.

Fitbit is a good example. I'm willing to bet a good amount of money that they sell a lot of the BLE beacon data they snarf up alongside their heart rate monitor data.

Fitbit is a good example of an app that requires permanent Bluetooth access, but a terrible example of a company likely to sell user data. Fitbit's users are its customers, and are the source of $1.5 billion per year in revenue. Any money gained from selling that data would be miniscule in comparison, and would put the main revenue stream at risk by alienating customers.

I work for but don't speak for Fitbit.

It's not Fitbit that necessarily is collecting this data, though. Fitbit might simply be using an SDK for Bluetooth detection, for example, that's provided by a company that does sell user data. The number of paid platforms and frameworks that are out there and used by all kinds of companies is crazy and it's not too big of a stretch to realize that some kind of tracking framework runs on the business of aggregating and selling that data while only providing the company in question using the framework with some of it.

It's not even too big of a stretch to realize how many free WordPress frameworks out there collect and sell aggregated site visitor data. I mean... if you're using a free Google Analytics service, do you honestly think they're not doing something with all that access to your site info?

Fitbit has its own Bluetooth stack.

That doesn't change the fact that they could be using another framework or library that has code to access Bluetooth. As long as the app has been granted access, the framework would have access too.

I really doubt there is any such application that most consumers would install. Maybe there are some industrial applications but most people have no use for Bluetooth apart from audio.

Bluetooth scales are fairly common. As are toy robots and quadrocopters that use Bluetooth for control.

Apple doesn’t pop up this permission dialog for their proprietary iBeacon system though, since thats also handled at the system level. With that taken into consideration, this feels less like a privacy feature and more like an anticompetitive move.

At least, that’s the situation to the best of my knowledge.

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