Apple Agrees to Make 'App Tracking Transparency' Changes in Germany

Apple has agreed to make changes to its App Tracking Transparency feature in Germany, according to the country's competition regulator.

Since the release of iOS 14.5 in April 2021, Apple has required apps to ask for permission before tracking a user's activity across other apps and websites for personalized advertising. If a user selects the "Ask App Not to Track" option, the app is unable to access the device's advertising identifier. Apple says the feature is designed to enhance user privacy, but some advertisers have complained that it has significantly impacted their revenue.

In Germany, Apple has agreed to remove "possibly discouraging symbols and wording" from the App Tracking Transparency prompt, the regulator said. Apps will also be "given more scope to explain to users what significance personalized advertising has for their offering and their business model," and the "freedom to combine the consent request required by Apple with the consent requests required under data protection law."

Apple has four months starting on the date it is formally served with the decision to implement the changes in Germany, and it will test them with app developers first, the regulator said. The changes will apply for seven years.

Over the past few years, Apple has faced similar regulatory pressures over the App Tracking Transparency feature in other EU countries, such as France, Italy, and Poland, and from the overarching European Commission.

Apple has maintained that App Tracking Transparency protects user privacy and is compliant with competition law in Germany. Nevertheless, it agreed to make the changes, and the regulator said the proceedings have thus concluded.

Apple issued the following statement regarding the changes:

At Apple, we believe privacy is a fundamental human right, and we introduced App Tracking Transparency to give users a simple way to control whether apps have permission to track their activity across other companies' apps and websites. While we believe the current ATT prompt provides a clear, easy-to-understand and effective way to keep users in control of their data—an opinion shared by the German data protection authorities—we have agreed to make changes to the text and formatting of the prompt at the FCO's request. These commitments ensure we can continue to provide this important privacy tool in Europe and keep users, not ad tech companies and data brokers, in control of their data.

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