Smartphone users might want to think twice the next time something embarrassing or potentially comprising is typed into their phones, a Connecticut-based app developer says.

In an 18-minute YouTube expose, Trevor Eckhart demonstrates how software from the analytics company Carrier IQ can record keystrokes on an ordinary smartphone.

Eckhart says the software is built into handheld phones made by a number of manufacturers.

The big three Canadian carriers, Bell (which owns CTV), Rogers and Telus, have all said they do not use the software.

Carrier IQ says its software is used to help companies improve their network or trouble shoot problems.

"While we look at many aspects of a device's performance, we are counting and summarizing performance, not recording keystrokes, or providing tracking tools," the company said.

But Eckhart asserts that most people don't know they are being tracked and aren't told they can turn it off.

Carrier IQ says its software is used on about 140 million devices worldwide.

Eckhart focuses on the software being used on Google's Android-enabled phones, but also said it can be used on Nokia's phones and on a BlackBerry handsets.

However, Canada's Research In Motion denied that, saying its BlackBerry smartphones are safe from Carrier IQ's software.

"RIM does not pre-install the Carrier IQ app on BlackBerry smartphones or authorize its carrier partners to install the Carrier IQ app before sales or distribution," RIM said in a statement.

"RIM also did not develop or commission the development of the Carrier IQ application, and has no involvement in the testing, promotion, or distribution of the app."

Nokia also denied their phones used the software.

Carmi Levy, a technology analyst based out of London, Ont., said any carrier using keystroke-logging software might as well shut down.

"Any carrier that would ever use this capability in any capacity would essentially be signing its own death warrant as far as consumers are concerned," he told CTV News in an email.

"Keystroke logging violates the fundamental trust that must exist between wireless consumers and their carriers."

He said the latest privacy breach is another warning to consumers that smartphones are essentially tiny computers and are vulnerable to all the same kind of security breaches as a laptop or desktop.