Audacity addresses “Spyware” claims

Audio editing and recording software Audacity was classified as “spyware” by news source FOSS Post this past weekend following the software’s most recent privacy policy change. On July 2, Audacity updated their privacy policy by adding new types of personal data that would be collected for app analytics and for the improvement of the application. The personal data includes OS name, OS version, a user’s country (determined by IP address), CPU, error messages, and crash reports. The new policy also states that any data necessary for “law enforcement, litigation and authorities’ requests” would be collected in a situation with legal enforcement.

This data can be shared among Audacity’s staff members, legal representatives, advisors, auditors, any competent law enforcement body, regulatory, government agency, court or “other third party”, and also to a “potential buyer.”

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Daniel Ray, the Head of Strategy at Muse Group (Audacity’s owner), issued a response to the “spyware” claims on GitHub clarifying the newly updated privacy policy for Audacity. Ray believes that the unclear wording of the policy change is the cause of rising concerns among Audacity users. He states that any personal data collected will not be sold or shared with third parties. Ray discusses that data collection is limited to basic system information, error report data, and the user’s IP address which is “irretrievable after 24 hours.” Additionally, users that use Audacity offline will not have their personal data collected.

The new privacy policy is not yet implemented into Audacity but will be included in the next version of the program (version 3.0.3).

Check out a brief overview of Audacity here in our list of the 10 Best Free Plugins on Plugin Boutique.

Feature Image Credit: Audacity