A new security feature introduced this week to some models of the latest iPhones and iPads will make it more difficult for law enforcement, spies and malicious hackers to obtain a person's precise location data from their phone provider.
According to Apple, enabling this new feature limits the accuracy of the location data that iPhones and mobile-enabled iPads share with customers' carriers. The company claims it protects the privacy of device owners by sharing less precise location information, such as general neighborhoods rather than street addresses.
Apple said turning on this feature will not affect the accuracy of location data shared with apps or with first responders during emergency calls.
The marginal accuracy location feature is supported on iPhone Air, iPhone 16e, and iPad Pro (M5) Wi-Fi + Cellular running iOS 26.3 and is available with a handful of global carriers, including Telekom, AIS and True Thai in Germany, EE and BT in the UK, and Boost Mobile in the US.
The company did not say why it introduced the new feature, and an Apple spokesperson did not comment on the record when contacted via email.
The new feature comes as law enforcement agencies increasingly use mobile phone carriers to access a person's location data to track them in real time and see where they move over a period of time.
Hackers also often target mobile carriers for sensitive data collected from their customers. Over the past year, several major U.S. cell phone companies, including AT&T and Verizon, have seen persistent intrusions by Chinese-backed hackers known as Salt Typhoons, seeking phone records and messages from senior U.S. officials.
Recent threats aside, long-known vulnerabilities in global mobile phone networks allow surveillance vendors to spy on individuals' location data anywhere in the world.
Mobile security expert Gary Miller, a researcher at Citizen Lab and senior director of network intelligence at iVerify, said that while carriers can determine the approximate location of a person's phone, the person's device itself is responsible for providing precise location data to the carrier.
“Most people don't know that devices can send location data to more than just apps,” Miller said. “meanwhile [the devices] Although you can limit GPS disclosure at the app level, you could not lock down the disclosure of your exact location to the network. ”
“While Apple's feature is limited to a small number of carrier networks, it is a step in the right direction to give users greater privacy controls,” he said.