Apple publishes data on route plans during lockdown

Following Google, Apple has put data online about people’s travel movements. Apple does this on the basis of requests for route planning in its Maps application.

Apple has launched a Mobility Trends Reports website. It is possible to enter a country, region or city and then the trend of planned routes is displayed. Apple says it updates the data daily. It is also possible to download a csv file with all data.

The data comes from Apple Maps. Apple emphasizes that Maps does not associate location data with the user’s Apple ID and that Apple does not keep location history. The data was obtained by counting how many requests Apple Maps receives for planning routes in certain regions.

Apple is sharing the data in the context of the corona pandemic. Earlier this month, Google started a similar initiative. The search giant regularly publishes reports showing the mobility trends per country and province with graphs.