If a user happened to have Lyft installed on their phone too, the entitlement could theoretically be used to monitor how the individual used a competitor’s app—a wild theory, maybe, but not entirely outlandish given Uber’s use of software nicknamed “Hell” to track drivers who worked for both Uber and Lyft.
The entitlement first appeared in Uber’s app around the time of the original Watch launch in 2015, according to Strafach. Apple only gave developers about four months before the official release of the Watch to slim down their apps and make them work on the new device, so it’s conceivable that Apple granted the entitlement to Uber in order to meet that tight launch deadline.
I don’t trust Uber to use this entitlement responsibly. Nor do I trust App Review to be able to police how the app is using it. It’s shocking that Apple would be so hypocritical about privacy and give special access to a known bad actor. I don’t jailbreak my phone, so I thought I knew that if I downloaded an app from the App Store there were certain things it just couldn’t do, especially without the OS prompting me to give it access. That’s apparently not the case. Fortunately, there likely aren’t many developers with enough clout to get this sort of special treatment.
Update (2017-10-25): See also: Kif Leswing.
"I thought I knew that if I downloaded an app from the App Store there were certain things it just couldn’t do, especially without the OS prompting me to give it access. That’s apparently not the case."
Exactly, and this is an incredible breach of trust from Apple. As you said: shocking and hypocritical.
"Fortunately, there likely aren’t many developers with enough clout to get this sort of special treatment" Who knows... Facebook? Whatsapp? Instagram? Tinder? Candy Crush? This is a scandal and we still have to hear from Apple about this.
Have we gotten an explanation from Apple yet about this?
I guess Apple is content to pretend this never happened?