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Whose Smartphone Is It? Should two private companies have complete control over the world's cellphones?

The author discusses his thoughts about the dominance of high technology firms Apple and Google in the smartphone industry, particularly the control that the companies have over smartphone operating software. He examines the introduction of the Exposure Notification contact tracing framework during...

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Published in:Communications of the ACM Vol. 64; no. 9; pp. 41 - 43
Main Author: Larus, James R.
Format: Article
Published: Association for Computing Machinery Sep2021
Subjects:
Smartphones
Apple Inc.
Google Inc.
Application program interfaces
Contact tracing
COVID-19 pandemic
Online Access:View this record in EBSCOhost
Summary:The author discusses his thoughts about the dominance of high technology firms Apple and Google in the smartphone industry, particularly the control that the companies have over smartphone operating software. He examines the introduction of the Exposure Notification contact tracing framework during the COVID-19 pandemic and the control exercised by Apple and Google, the importance of application programming interfaces (APIs), and issues of privacy and privacy protocols.