I want to know how many people are using my app and how long they are using the app on average. Can I do this without violating any apple agreements? Or do I have to ask the user to permit the behaviour tracking? Or does Apple generally forbid this kind of information tracking?
Greets, Sven
The SDK Agreement states:
3.3.6 Any form of user or device data collection, or image, picture or voice capture or recording performed by the Application (collectively “Recordings”), and any form of user data, content or information processing, maintenance, uploading, syncing, or transmission performed by the Application (collectively "Transmissions") must comply with all applicable privacy laws and regulations as well as any Apple program requirements related to such aspects, including but not limited to any notice or consent requirements. In particular, a reasonably conspicuous visual indicator must be displayed to the user as part of the Application to indicate that a Recording is taking place.
3.3.7 ... - Applications may not use any robot, spider, site search or other retrieval application or device to scrape, retrieve or index services provided by Apple or its licensors, or to collect information about users for any unauthorized purpose.
I'd say, you have to ask Apple if the information you want is deemed as an authorized purpose. If it does you'd still have to ask the User if he wants to submit data.
One thing to think about is how to legitimately incorporate user accounts and web services into your application -- not for the purpose of tracking, but to genuinely give the user extra functionality. If you do that, you get some tracking as a by-product.