Hats off to the innovation! Apple have filed a patent which would give them the power to kill an iPhone which might seem stolen to them. Wow! How thoughtful! But, there's a nice big catch to this. The term "stolen" has additional interpretations according to the Cupertino giant.

Apple will look out for any activity on the iPhone which might indicate that the device has fallen into unauthorised hands. These activities include:-

• a sudden rise in memory usage which might be due to the running of a hacking program.


• unlocking the mobile phone or replacing the SIM.


• and even iPhone jailbreaking (which is actually legal now).

Once any suspected activity is detected, Apple would be able to:-

• transfer sensitive data to a remote server, and delete the same on the iPhone.


• compare voices of the present user with the pre-stored voice of the rightful owner.


• sense the heartbeat of the present user and compare it with that of the authorised user


• assess the vibration profile with the accelerometer and compare it with a set of pre-recorded profiles, to find if the device is being transported

AND, most remarkably,

• even remotely turn on the iPhone camera to take pictures of the surroundings. This would be used in conjunction with GPS to help trace the device.

Now how thoughtful is this! While this patent seems targeted at making the iPhones more secure, the hidden motive seems to be disabling jailbreaking and unlocking.

While using the above methods to track a stolen device and deleting sensitive information is a good thing; it should be restricted for use if and only if a customer registers a complaint about a lost iPhone. Else it only means invasion of privacy. Moreover, jailbreaking is legal now. Plus, there are apps that can help track and delete data remotely. It needn't always be initiated by Apple.

Most devices, which are remotely killed become useless for good. So what are the odds that once the iPhone is killed, it can be revived again?

If this Apple patent receives approval, then it might be good-bye to all those wonderful Cydia apps, good-bye to unlocking, good-bye to tethering for free and maybe good-bye to privacy as well.

Via Pocket-lint, Cnet.co.uk