App seems to ignore iOS Privacy setting

[b-gee]

I've assumed that iOS enforces its Privacy settings, but now it appears that it might not: Fantastical 2 displays one of my calendars even though its iOS Privacy setting for Calendars is set to Off (i.e., deny access). The calendar is sync'd with a CalDAV server (I also have calendars that are sync'd with iTunes, and they are hidden as expected).

I first observed this behavior with Fantastical 2 v2.1.4 on iOS 8.0.2. The misbehavior persisted when I updated Fantastical 2 to v2.2, and when I updated iOS to v8.1. I'm using an iPhone 5S.

Recap: When Fantastical 2's iOS Privacy settings are:
- Calendars=Off, Reminders=On: Fantastical 2 does not behave as expected (displays a CalDAV calendar, and all reminders; should display only reminders)
- Calendars=On, Reminders=Off: Fantastical 2 behaves as expected (displays all calendars, no reminders)
- Calendars=On, Reminders=On: Fantastical 2 behaves as expected (displays all calendars and reminders)
- Calendars=Off, Reminders=Off: Fantastical 2 behaves as expected (does not display any calendars or reminders)

I would like to ask two questions:

1. Has anyone else observed this behavior in Fantastical 2?

2. Has anyone observed other apps gaining access that should be denied by iOS Privacy settings?

 

[NoBoMac]

I don't use CalDAV (that I know of: maybe iCloud is using CalDAV behind the scenes), so, no idea re: that.

But my guess, not so much a Fantastical issue but something deeper with iOS. Fantastical must be using some API that's "Can I access calendar/reminder?" before actually trying to read.

Either iOS is broken along those lines, or, iOS is not processing CalDAV correctly, and somehow mixing things internally.

Alternatively, maybe there's some odd configuration of the CalDAV server/service that's sending over data in an odd way.

Next debug step is to go into Apple's stock calendar and reminder's apps and see if there's anything displaying oddly (eg. Calendar entries in Reminders, duplicate entries, etc).

 

[Phil A.]

Sounds to me like Fantastical is going straight to the CalDav server and accessing the calendars that way rather than through iOS, in which case it wouldn't make any difference what the settings in iOS are

 

[b-gee]

Thank you for your ideas, NoBoMac and Phil A!

I should have mentioned earlier that:
- I configured access to my CalDAV calendar this way: Settings > Mail, Contacts, Calendars > Add Account > Other > Add CalDAV Account. (I'm not using iCloud.)
- My reminders come from that CalDAV account.
- iOS's Calendar and Reminders apps behave as expected: data appears only as expected, with no duplicates.
- The Apple iOS Developer Library suggests that calendar and reminder data are accessed through different requests for events vs reminders (even though they are stored in the same database). So it appears that the framework is designed to let iOS enforce separate Privacy settings for Calendars vs Reminders.

Fantastical 2 would have no way of connecting to my CalDAV calendar without getting the connection information from iOS. So regardless of whether the app is connecting to the Event Store or connecting to the CalDav calendar directly, I guess that iOS doesn't enforce Privacy settings, but instead expects apps to respect them - does that seem accurate?

I guess I should contact Fantastical's developer, but I'm still wondering whether I should contact Apple - i.e., should iOS permit this?