When it comes to smartphone apps, many consumers may be reluctant to pay $2 or $5 for something they're not sure they'll even like, but today, many free apps might make that cost seem relatively small.
Free apps are far more likely to track consumers' movements and record private personal data than those that cost money, according to a report from
Juniper Security. For instance, free apps are 401 percent more likely to keep location data, and 314 percent more likely to access users' contacts.
Further, 6.39 percent of them allow the program to make phone calls in the background while the program is open, compared to just 1.88 percent of paid apps, the report said. Another 5.53 percent can access a device's camera while just 2.11 percent of their paid counterparts do the same.
Eduard Goodman, chief privacy officer for
IDentity Theft 911, has a blog about the ways in which consumers can do more to make sure their privacy is relatively intact when they use their smartphones and other devices.
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