The flashlight app on your phone may be reporting your GPS location. Seriously. Here’s what you can do to keep nosy apps like that from overrunning your smartphone. Without actually doing what you should.

Read my entire column in USA TODAY here.

Have I really fallen and can’t get up? Or am I just starting my sit-up regime? If you’re in the room with me, that would be an easy call to make. It’s a different matter entirely for a smart device. It has a stable of sensors feeding it light, motion, temperature, pressure and other environmental inputs.

So how to turn that into actionable data? That’s the focus of a new industry initiative.

Watch my interview with Ian Chen, a manager in FreeScale’s sensor business unit, HERE.

Are you tired of listening to your uber-healthy co-workers comparing calories and steps at the office? Those of you with chronic conditions can now take heart. Thanks to a new wave of wearables, soon it will be your turn to annoy the crap out of them. Provided companies can clear regulatory hurdles, that is.

Read my entire Information Week column HERE.