packaging an application that phones home

[Eric Smith]

I'm working on an RPM package for MeshLab, a GPL'd program for 
processing unstructured 3D triangular meshes:

    http://meshlab.sourceforge.net/

My interest is that it is useful with 3D printers, e.g. RepRap, 
MakerBot, or even commercial printers.

The Licenses page of the MeshLab wiki gives a privacy disclaimer stating 
that it phones home periodically to check for availability of updated 
versions, and that it uploads some aggregated statistical data about the 
average number and size of the opened/saved meshes.  Nothing personally 
identifiable, though they obviously could capture the source IP address:

    http://meshlab.sourceforge.net/wiki/index.php/Licenses

Their answer is for people that don't want that to use a firewall.  I 
don't think that it's acceptable for software to phone home without the 
user's explicit consent, and that the user shouldn't have to take 
positive action such as installing or configuring a firewall to prevent 
that connection.

Is there a Fedora policy about this kind of thing?  It seems analogous 
to Anaconda uploading system information, which is only done with user 
consent.

Would there be a problem with Fedora accepting a package if I patch it 
to disable network connections unless the user sets an environment 
variable to allow them?  I would document that in a README.fedora doc 
file that I'd put in the package.

Thanks!
Eric