Hong Kong News

Nonpartisan, Noncommercial, unconstrained.
Thursday, Mar 28, 2024

Apple to start enforcing privacy notifications that upset Facebook

Apple to start enforcing privacy notifications that upset Facebook

Facebook has accused Apple not of giving users' more choice, but of skewing the market to its own advantage.

Apple said it will introduce over the coming weeks a new privacy notification that will enable users to prevent companies such as Facebook from tracking their activity on other apps and websites.

The update will be included in iOS 14.5 making it mandatory for iPhone apps to gain the device owner's permission before collecting this additional data.

The move has provoked enormous criticism from Facebook which slammed Apple for what it described as "a discouraging prompt" that would allow users to choose whether the company could collect their data or not.

Apple will display a prompt giving users a choice over app tracking


Apple's App Tracking Transparency (ATT) feature is being released just as the iPhone-maker and Facebook are on course for a series of clashes.

A number of looming court cases and technological developments are pitting the two companies' business models against each other, and the technology industry will be reshaped in the winner's image.

Facebook has claimed the ATT feature would harm app developers and small businesses, and that it was an anti-competitive measure designed to benefit Apple's own advertising features.

Apple responded by saying it welcomed in-app advertising and was not prohibiting tracking, "simply requiring each app to obtain explicit user consent in order to track so that it will be more transparent and under user control".

Earlier this year the company's chief executive Tim Cook delivered a scathing attack on Facebook, albeit without mentioning the company by name.

Mr Cook suggesting the company's data collection practices had fuelled the mob attack at the Capitol building in Washington DC.

Speaking virtually at a conference in Brussels, Mr Cook said: "We can no longer turn a blind eye to a theory of technology that says all engagement is good engagement.

"At a moment of rampant disinformation and conspiracy theories juiced by algorithms... it's long past time to stop pretending that this approach doesn't come with a cost - of polarisation, of lost trust and, yes, of violence."

Part of the issue, said Mr Cook, was that smartphone apps contain too many trackers which "surveil and identify users across apps, watching and recording their behaviour" often without users knowing that this is taking place.

"Technology does not need vast troves of personal data, stitched together across dozens of websites and apps, in order to succeed. Advertising existed and thrived for decades without it. We're here today because the path of least resistance is rarely the path of wisdom," he added.

"If a business is built on misleading users, on data exploitation, on choices that are no choices at all, then it does not deserve our praise. It deserves reform.

"Will the future belong to the innovations that make our lives better, more fulfilled and more human?

"Or will it belong to those tools that prize our attention to the exclusion of everything else, compounding our fears and aggregating extremism, to serve ever-more-invasively-targeted ads over all other ambitions?"

Apple is introducing new app tracking protections


Facebook's criticisms came as the social media company also announced it would be joining Fortnite maker Epic Games' legal fight against Apple. It said it would be providing relevant information on how Apple's policies adversely impacted the company.

"Free apps and the entrepreneurs and creators who build them... rely on advertising to make money, and in turn, provide free content to people - from your morning news to the game you play in line at the coffee shop to that comedy show you watched on Friday night," explained Facebook.

"Apple has every incentive to use their dominant platform position to interfere with how our apps and other apps work, which they regularly do," Mr Zuckerberg told investors. "They say they are doing this to help people, but the moves clearly track their competitive interests."

Newsletter

Related Articles

Hong Kong News
0:00
0:00
Close
It's always the people with the dirty hands pointing their fingers
Paper straws found to contain long-lasting and potentially toxic chemicals - study
FTX's Bankman-Fried headed for jail after judge revokes bail
Blackrock gets half a trillion dollar deal to rebuild Ukraine
Steve Jobs' Son Launches Venture Capital Firm With $200 Million For Cancer Treatments
Google reshuffles Assistant unit, lays off some staffers, to 'supercharge' products with A.I.
End of Viagra? FDA approved a gel against erectile dysfunction
UK sanctions Russians judges over dual British national Kara-Murza's trial
US restricts visa-free travel for Hungarian passport holders because of security concerns
America's First New Nuclear Reactor in Nearly Seven Years Begins Operations
Southeast Asia moves closer to economic unity with new regional payments system
Political leader from South Africa, Julius Malema, led violent racist chants at a massive rally on Saturday
Today Hunter Biden’s best friend and business associate, Devon Archer, testified that Joe Biden met in Georgetown with Russian Moscow Mayor's Wife Yelena Baturina who later paid Hunter Biden $3.5 million in so called “consulting fees”
'I am not your servant': IndiGo crew member, passenger get into row over airline meal
Singapore Carries Out First Execution of a Woman in Two Decades Amid Capital Punishment Debate
Spanish Citizenship Granted to Iranian chess player who removed hijab
US Senate Republican Mitch McConnell freezes up, leaves press conference
Speaker McCarthy says the United States House of Representatives is getting ready to impeach Joe Biden.
San Francisco car crash
This camera man is a genius
3D ad in front of Burj Khalifa
Next level gaming
BMW driver…
Google testing journalism AI. We are doing it already 2 years, and without Google biased propoganda and manipulated censorship
Unlike illegal imigrants coming by boats - US Citizens Will Need Visa To Travel To Europe in 2024
Musk announces Twitter name and logo change to X.com
The politician and the journalist lost control and started fighting on live broadcast.
The future of sports
Unveiling the Black Hole: The Mysterious Fate of EU's Aid to Ukraine
Farewell to a Music Titan: Tony Bennett, Renowned Jazz and Pop Vocalist, Passes Away at 96
Alarming Behavior Among Florida's Sharks Raises Concerns Over Possible Cocaine Exposure
Transgender Exclusion in Miss Italy Stirs Controversy Amidst Changing Global Beauty Pageant Landscape
Joe Biden admitted, in his own words, that he delivered what he promised in exchange for the $10 million bribe he received from the Ukraine Oil Company.
TikTok Takes On Spotify And Apple, Launches Own Music Service
Global Trend: Using Anti-Fake News Laws as Censorship Tools - A Deep Dive into Tunisia's Scenario
Arresting Putin During South African Visit Would Equate to War Declaration, Asserts President Ramaphosa
Hacktivist Collective Anonymous Launches 'Project Disclosure' to Unearth Information on UFOs and ETIs
Typo sends millions of US military emails to Russian ally Mali
Server Arrested For Theft After Refusing To Pay A Table's $100 Restaurant Bill When They Dined & Dashed
The Changing Face of Europe: How Mass Migration is Reshaping the Political Landscape
China Urges EU to Clarify Strategic Partnership Amid Trade Tensions
The Last Pour: Anchor Brewing, America's Pioneer Craft Brewer, Closes After 127 Years
Democracy not: EU's Digital Commissioner Considers Shutting Down Social Media Platforms Amid Social Unrest
Sarah Silverman and Renowned Authors Lodge Copyright Infringement Case Against OpenAI and Meta
Why Do Tech Executives Support Kennedy Jr.?
The New York Times Announces Closure of its Sports Section in Favor of The Athletic
BBC Anchor Huw Edwards Hospitalized Amid Child Sex Abuse Allegations, Family Confirms
Florida Attorney General requests Meta CEO's testimony on company's platforms' alleged facilitation of illicit activities
The Distorted Mirror of actual approval ratings: Examining the True Threat to Democracy Beyond the Persona of Putin
40,000 child slaves in Congo are forced to work in cobalt mines so we can drive electric cars.
×