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Growth of GPS Phones Raises Privacy and Regulatory Issues

Research and Markets report examines markets, location finding techniques, legal and regulatory implications and technologies that manage location privacy.

Annual shipments of GPS-enabled phones will grow rapidly over the period 2008-2012 according to Research and Markets. GPS phones will account for 37 percent of all shipments (535 million), according to a new report. The number of users of mobile location services accessed via GPS phones is also expected to grow strongly. The report predicts that by 2012 the worldwide user base of the most popular location-enabled services, navigation and mobile social networking, will reach 150 and 127 million respectively. This growth in the availability of handset location information (LI) raises many questions about the degree to which users can be protected from potential abuses of their LI.

The report's analysis of the emerging LBS market reveals that there is a potential for serious abuses of location privacy in cases where the use of location information has not been adequately regulated.