Apple has clearly decided on the deferred anti-tracking function in iOS 14 known. One remains “unconditionally committed” to the introduction of the App Tracking Transparency (ATT) framework, as the group emphasized on Thursday. It is planned that iOS apps will have to obtain permission from the user for advertising tracking in the future; this should be enforced at the operating system level.

NGOs demand immediate tracking protection Several human and civil rights organizations, including Amnesty International and the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), asked Apple in October to use the previously released iOS 14 implemented function immediately. The postponement runs counter to Apple’s Human Rights Policy, in which the group is committed to protecting the privacy of its users.

The postponement should be the developers Give the necessary time to update their “systems and data practices”, Apple explained again, the implementation is still scheduled for “beginning 2021”. The ATT framework already exists in iOS 14, apps can already use it to obtain tracking permission from the user – but that is currently the case still optional.

This dialog should be iOS 14 in future if apps want to access the advertising ID.

(Image: Apple)

Advertising industry is storming Apps get access to the unique Advertising ID (IDFA) of the device. This allows cross-app advertising tracking or the creation of profiles. Up to iOS 13, users had to block this access option manually in the settings (opt-out). In iOS 14 this should in future be the case by default until the user gives his tracking consent (opt-in). Since many users presumably do not give their consent, this makes it more difficult to deliver targeted advertising and thus devalues ​​banners, according to the advertising industry – a “tectonic shift” is feared.

Facebook especially had Warned several times against the “aggressive change”: This not only affects their own advertising business, but also smaller companies: A reduction in the effectiveness of advertising hurts “smaller companies in particular to grow,” said Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg. That was “simply not true”, countered Apple on Thursday, there was no data that small companies would be particularly burdened – instead, the “data race” would primarily benefit large corporations with huge data sets. One hopes for the return of data protection-compliant advertising.

The advertising industry is currently going by storm against the tracking opt-in: In France, a cartel complaint has been filed against Apple for this reason, the group is using data protection as a cover for the abuse of market power, it is argued. At the same time, data protection complaints against Apple are running in Germany and Spain because of the advertising ID – the company is secretly putting a cookie in the pockets of all users. Apple rejected this, saying that the advertising ID was not used “in any way”. (lbe)