Find My Friends with Notifications [iOS6]

With the new iOS6, the Find My Friends feature has a nifty new tricks up its sleeve. The sort of things that we had heard about but that only now we can test for real. For all those who never heard of Find My Friends, its a service similar to Google's own Latitude, that tracks your position as well as your friends, and allows you to see where everyone is, in real time - provided they've granted you acess, of course.
(Just keep in mind that unlike Google Latitude, in Find My Friends you'll have to invite back the person who requested your location info in order to see them as well.)

Though Find My Friends alread had the temporary events setting - now you can do a lot more thanks to the new notifications. You can specify you want to be warned when a friend leaves or arrives at a certain place.

Want to know when he/she gets leave work so you can meet up somewhere? No problem, it takes just a couple of taps. Or maybe you want to know when they're about to leave their home and heading your way, so you can get ready. The possibilities are endless!

Also, now you can also mark some of your friends as favorites in Find my Friends, so they show up first on the contact list.

Find My Friends to get Geofence Alerts on iOS6

Find My Friends on iOS 6 is about to become a lot more useful - and to once again raise some privacy concerns, for sure.

If you don't know what Find My Friends is, it's the Google Latitude equivalent for Apple's iOS users: a service that allows you to see where your friends/family are, in real time, provided they've allowed it, of course.

This service offer a bit more control over Google's Latitude however, by allowing you to create time-specific events, that allow you to share your location with a group of people you might now want to share your location permanently. For instance, if you're throwing a party somewhere, you might want to let "everyone" where it is and how to get there. But when the event expires, you don't have to manually take care of it, and your location goes back to being shared with just your most trusted friends.


With iOS6 you'll be able to create geofenced zones that alert you when friends exnter/exit those areas. For instance, you might set up a zone around your home, to know when a friend is arriving; or instantly find out when your kids get to school or leave it; etc.

Indeed useful... but before you start imagining the "stalking" factor such system would allow, let's keep in mind that's exactly what you could already do by simply keeping an eye on your friends location on Find My Friends/Google Latitude. Besides, these services require each users express consent so that their location is shared, and with whom. So... if you're not confortable knowing some "friend" might be keeping tabs when you go somewhere... simply stop sharing your location with them.