Recently, a husband allegedly caught his wife cheating on him using Apple's new Find My Friend app.  While it's not entirely clear if this really happened or if it is an internet hoax the issue of spying on someone via location technologies in smartphones is real.

When I first started working on En Route's concept and design Apple was getting their hand-slapped for retaining location data on device. Clearly, protecting a user's privacy is paramount. 

En Route is designed around routes.  Routes are, in simple terms, the various trips we take during our daily local travels.  In our first release, routes are bounded by a single start point and single end point.  Routes are limited by time - and when a route comes to an end so does its location sharing. 

A key design feature of En Route is giving control to the user who shares - they pick who they share with and the sharer can manually end their routes.  We validate email addresses at account sign-up to verify the user before they see another user's location on a map.

Ray Kurzweil has been quoted as saying, "technology is a double-edge sword."  That is, in the hands of humans, it can be used for good and bad.  In the alleged case of a husband spying on a wife, we think he chose the bad use of the technology.  "Spying," "tracking" and "monitoring" are not activities we condone.  Wanting to spy is a disposition that is not part of our value system.

We hope people will make good choices when they use technology, but we also know human nature is not always what we'd like.   We'll continue to improve the app along these lines, emphasizing user privacy, and we welcome any feedback from users to make improvements.

In the meantime, get yourself some good stuff -- download En Route.