Has it been confirmed whether or not the iPhone uses this? Since Jobs never let the carriers touch the base OS, I'm assuming it does not.
When CarrierIQ was dubbed one of the Fierce 15, they were working with seven of the top ten major OEM’s, as well as Verizon Wireless, AT&T, and Sprint. Currently, Trevor has found CarrierIQ in a number of Sprint phones, including HTC and Samsung Android devices. CarrierIQ is confirmed to be found on the iPhone or on feature phones, but Trevor has found RIM’s Blackberry handsets and several Nokia devices with CarrierIQ on board as well.
But that was a passing mention and I haven't found anywhere else to back up that claim.
From a practical standpoint, manufacturers and service providers want that ability. But it's how they intend to use the information that counts. Nobody has proven to me so far that it's entirely benign.
> Nobody has proven to me so far that it's entirely benign.
The first one of those is clearly true - Apple has control over hardware and software and could put pretty much anything they wanted in there to track your activity.
The second one is, to my knowledge, pure speculation. Apart from their anonymous stats - that you are able to opt out of - I've seen nothing to suggest that anything similar to this on iPhone.
I think Apple actually customizes the firmware packages for each carrier since they maintain separate versions for ATT/Verizon for each iPhone model...
I don't even have an iPhone nowadays, I'm just curious. :)
Since what CarrierIQ is doing is considered illegal in many countries I'm fairly sure Apple wouldn't want to open themselves up to that type of liability.
What remains to be seen if any of that data is sent to Apple if you opt out of "diagnostic data" sending.
Of course, the possibility remains open that Apple simply implemented something similar in-house.