The game allows you to create either a Pokémon account (a third party account designed expressly for Pokémon GO and other Pokémon stuff) or to use your Google account. Almost everyone is opting to use their Google account because the Pokémon account system is getting slammed with too much traffic.
That shouldn’t be a big deal, right? Tons of websites allow you to use your Google account for credentials instead of creating a separate login. But here’s the problem: unlike other apps and websites that only grab permissions for a few things, blogger Adam Reeve pointed out that Pokémon GO is given full access to your Google account–and it takes it without even asking you.
Pokémon Go isn’t reading your Gmail. The makers of the hot, new mobile game are fixing a bug that allowed the app to gain full access to users’ accounts, when they signed in using their Google account information. The company claims it didn’t mean to ask for such elevated permissions, and it will now correct this.
The app had the power to access your Gmail, your Google Docs, your Google Photos, as well as track your location history, your search history, and more. And this was in addition to the app’s already necessary high-level access to things like your current location, camera, and phone sensors, which are needed for gameplay.
The issue was isolated to iOS and only affected those who signed in using Google.
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