Phone snoopers

SIR – On Sunday, I sent a “Happy New Year” text message to friends.

Quite soon thereafter, I started to receive messages back along the lines of “Wow!” and “Amazing”, which seemed an unusual response. Upon investigation, I discovered that if the recipients had an iphone, a fanfare of fireworks would appear on their screen when they opened my message.

While at one level this seems a harmless programming trick by Apple, it does mean that text messages are automatically being read by their system, looking for a pattern of words.

What is to stop mobile phone companies using this technology for a more invasive or sinister purpose? David Miller

Chigwell, Essex