This confusing mix and match for sharing location data embedded within iMessage photo attachments needs to be addressed. Each photo can embed the date, time and location it was taken, enabling you to categorize photos by location. Yes, this has gone overboard-as seen with permission abuse ( especially on Android), with countless apps monetizing our location data, but when limited it’s invaluable. In reality, location tagging is one of the most useful features on your phone, enabling all your mapping and navigation apps, contextual searches and alerts, weather, news, and the rest. Google is playing catch-up in Android 11-but at least it’s now introducing one-time-only options to tag locations. Not only will iOS 14 introduce app-by-app permission requests for data sharing-the assumption being we’ll almost always say no, it will also limit most location sharing to an approximate 10 square miles-no more address tagging. Again, location sharing is at the heart of this. Apple and (to a lesser extent) Google are now taking steps to provide more protection on what is shared and with who.
