Sprint to disable Carrier IQ

Sprint is to disable the Carrier IQ software on all of its handsets and has stopped collecting data from it, according to MobileBurn.

Sprint was using Carrier IQ to collecting diagnostic data on 26 million handsets made by Audiovox, Franklin, HTC, Huawei, Kyocera, LG, Motorola, Novatel, PalmOne, Samsung, Sanyo, and Sierra Wireless. Some 1.3 million devices are set to send data back to the carrier at any one time.

AT&T has Carrier IQ installed on some 900,000 handsets, with some 575,000 sending data back to the carrier.

It's been a tough December for Carrier IQ. First the controversy about the software logging user information on handsets, then the admission that a bug may have caused text message data to be intercepted, then coming under scrutiny from the FTC and the FCC, and now being dropped by a major carrier.

In relation to the FTC and FCC investigations, a Carrier IQ spokeswoman said that the company was “complying with all investigations at this time as we have nothing to hide. We have been completely transparent through this process.”

The capabilities of Carrier IQ were first bought to light by 25-year-old Trevor Eckhart.

If Carrier IQ is innocuous and provides the carriers with important diagnostic data, why is Sprint dumping it? Does bad publicity outweigh the benefits the software offers?

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Related:

• Carrier IQ comes under FTC and FCC scrutiny
• Carrier IQ ‘may have’ collected text messages
• Carrier IQ - The FBI connection
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• Android bloatware results in serious security flaws
• Check your Android handset for Carrier IQ rootkit
• How to disable the Carrier IQ ‘rootkit’ on your iPhone
• CarrierIQ: Follow the money and it is the carriers behind it
• Finding and cleaning out your smartphone’s Carrier IQ poison
• Which phones, networks run Carrier IQ mobile tracking software?