US lawmakers believe privacy rules should be followed by mobile app developers

US lawmakers said that mobile privacy rules should be applicable to third-party app developers along with wireless carriers.

Thursday, representatives Edward Markey and Joe Barton, co-chairs of the House Bi-Partisan Privacy Caucus, released letters they received from Verizon Wireless, AT&T Inc, Sprint Nextel Corp and T-Mobile in response to their inquiries last month about the collection, use and storage of location data.

From the letters it appears that the mobile operators usually ask customers before accessing their location data. Meantime, mobile phone app developers are not so forthcoming and considerate.

"Third-party developers can access the location of customers any time they want," Barton said. "They shouldn't have free reign over your location data and personally identifiable information."

Markey echoed this sentiment, saying consumer privacy protections must apply "across the entire wireless ecosystem -- from wireless carriers, to mobile handset makers, to application developers."