related question workplace.stackexchange.com/questions/125075/…

You are getting answers that are completely invalid in large parts of the world. Please add a location tag to your question, so we can advise you based on the actual laws and regulations in your country. There are no globally valid labor laws.

@nvoigt added a tag

Great, thank you!

Can't you just turn off the location tracking feature once you are done with your day? (on android at least, it is easy to revoke rights afterwards) - Or just uninstall the app? This can be done during work time, and it takes 20 sec.

I do have others apps on my phone that rely on these features though, and uninstalling is what I have been doing so far

I don't mean to disable the location tracking but revoking the location tracking for this app (maybe not possible on iOs, not sure). To be honest, I would stick with uninstalling it at the end of your day. It takes 20 sec, and it's just simpler for everybody else.

Settings->Location services->your app->allow access to location services->never/only when the app is running. Both options should solve the problem. Are you saying the app circumvents this?

yes @Hobbes the "only when the app is running" doesn't make the app function as it should, it just prompts me to select the always option

I suspect that will make it difficult to get the app accepted in the iOS store.

that is indeed news to me, I was not aware of that, a screen in the app just shows the text asking me to give the always on permission, not that iOS itself prompts me to

@Hobbes FitBit has a similar thing for syncing - it won't let you sync with a watch unless location is down as "always on" but this has been accepted on iOS and android. You can disable it after you're done though. The app will throw a fit when you first load it but you can switch it back on for that moment and then off again once you're done.

The thing with location vs tracking might be due to iOS requiring "tracking" permissions to share location data with a third party. I can imagine the app uploading your location data to an external service for further refinement or analysis to make them "high accuracy". That's just a wild guess of mine though, there's no way to be sure without knowing the internals of the app.

You say there is nothing wrong with the app, but you don't feel comfortable 'giving an "always on" location permission and the "tracking" (iOS) to an app that I will just be using once or twice a month.' But presumably your end users, who will also only use it periodically, will also need to have this permission enabled. Either you're working on an app you feel comfortable having the end users and you use, or you're not. So which is it?

Just because the application requests the permission does not mean it actually is performing that tracking. The way Android and iOS works is if you use any method that requires a particular permission, it must request that permission, when the application is installed. Why are you installing and testing a work application on your personal phone. Why are the developers of the application not performing their own test, on phones, used for that testing?

@mkdir: That's a false dilemma. The end-users may have a different risk profile. They may be using company issued phones that they leave in lockers at the tend of the day. They may be getting paid extra for the infringement on their privacy. They may value being easily found if their job puts them in dangerous circumstances. They might be able to decline to use the app.

@Oddthinking: That's fair for the most part. Working through that, if these workers get phones for their job it strengthens the argument that OP should get one. Getting paid extra for their privacy only works, to me, if they have the option to decline the infringement (which they may, we don't know), which is also true of them being able to decline using the app. Being easily found is still accomplished with permissions you can turn on and off, however. I guess I have trouble believing that the end users may get these privileges when OP doesn't get them, however.

@mkdir the end users are riders (like uber drivers or food delivery for example) and they need to have location enabled for their tasks to go as planned, these users will be using the app multiple times a day unlike me where I only test the app

@Donald by testing I mean, there are scenarios where I have to perform a mock run using the app to get logs, the only way for now is to actually use the app to perform the steps and get the logs I want

If you test the App overboarding permission request and undocumented purpose is a thing which should be reported as a bug (however there are some strange iOS permission relations, so tracking might be needed, „while the App is in use“).

Can you spoof the location (especially since you're supposed to test the app)?