Carrier IQ: What is it?

Carrier IQ, a hidden application found on millions of smartphones across the world, is logging almost everything you do, a US security researcher claimed earlier this week, BBC News reported.

Trevor Eckhart explained that the software can log locations, websites visited, key presses and many other of your daily actions.

Gizmodo explained what the software does:

Carrier IQ's software is installed in your phone at the deepest level. You don't know it's there. You are never warned this is happening. You can't opt-in and you certainly can't opt-out.

The commercial spyware sits between the user and the applications in the phone so, no matter how secure and private your apps are, the spyware intercepts anything you do. From your location to your web browsing addresses and passwords to the content of your text messages.

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Carrier IQ, on the other hand, denied that the code is spying.

"While we look at many aspects of a device's performance, we are counting and summarizing performance, not recording keystrokes or providing tracking tools," the company said in a statement. 

BlackBerry's parent company Research In Motion (RIM) explained that it does not install the software on BlackBerries, and does not authorize carriers to add the software later, though Eckhart had claimed that Nokia and BlackBerry used the software.

Here's a video in which Eckhart explains Carrier IQ:

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If you have an iPhone, you may also have Carrier IQ installed, but it's easy to turn off.