App Tracking Transparency

With the launch of iOS 14.5, apps are no longer allowed to access the IDFA or tracking advertiser on your iPhone, iPad, or Apple TV without your express permission, keeping your app data more private. Apps use your IDFA to track you across different apps and websites, keeping tabs on your preferences and app usage habits. When an app wants to use your IDFA, you'll see a popup that says...

Over the past few days, some iPhone users have said the "Allow Apps to Request to Track" toggle in the Settings app is suddenly grayed out on their devices. The issue was highlighted by @iDeviceHelpus on X, and in a post on Reddit. Apple's fine print below the grayed-out toggle says "this setting cannot be changed because a profile is restricting it, or because your Apple ID is being...

In a letter sent to Federal Trade Commission (FTC) chair Lina Khan today, four U.S. legislators said the FTC should "investigate Apple and Google's role in transforming online advertising into an intense system of surveillance," according to The Wall Street Journal. Apple and Google "knowingly facilitated harmful practices by building advertising-specific tracking IDs into their mobile...

Germany's Federal Cartel Office, the Bundeskartellamt, has initiated proceedings against Apple to investigate whether its tracking rules and anti-tracking technology are anti-competitive and self-serving, according to a press release. The proceeding announced today will review under competition law Apple's tracking rules and specifically its App Tracking Transparency Framework (ATT) in order ...

Apple is unlikely to have seen a significant financial benefit from App Tracking Transparency since the privacy feature launched last year, according to Kinshuk Jerath, Professor of Business in the Marketing Division at Columbia Business School. In an Apple-commissioned report, Jerath said claims that billions of advertising dollars moved from companies like Meta to Apple due to the...

A new report has highlighted how three top prominent executives initially found themselves at odds in early deliberations about Apple's App Tracking Transparency framework. According to the report from The Information, the executives who disagreed over how far Apple should go in protecting user privacy in digital advertising included Apple's Craig Federighi, who oversees software...

"Loose" interpretations of Apple's privacy policies allow apps such as Facebook and Snapchat to continue tracking users for targeted advertising even when they have asked to not be tracked, The Financial Times reports. In May, Apple launched its App Tracking Transparency feature that allows users to opt-out of being tracked across apps and websites for advertising purposes. Seven months...

Peloton has become the latest company to blame Apple's ad-related privacy changes in iOS for negatively impacting its business, according to a new report by Bloomberg's Mark Gurman. Best known for its at-home exercise equipment and online fitness classes, Peloton blamed the App Tracking Transparency (ATT) rules Apple introduced in iOS 14.5 for making it more difficult to add new...

Undeterred by Apple's recent anti-tracking privacy changes, Facebook continues to rake in billions in advertising revenue, as evidenced by its latest fiscal 2021 second quarter results announced Wednesday. On the company's Q2 earnings call, the social network revealed it had accumulated $28 billion in ad revenue, representing a 56% year-on-year increase. That saw Facebook more than double...

Mobile advertisers are beginning to spend significantly more money targeting Android users thanks to Apple's implementation of a framework on iOS, severely impacting the amount of data companies can collect about users on iPhone and iPad. As reported by The Wall Street Journal, following the April roll-out of ATT, or the App Tracking Transparency framework, which requires that all apps on ‌iP...

Apple's crackdown on Chinese apps that tried to bypass its new privacy rules has successfully thwarted a coordinated effort to create a new way of tracking iPhones for advertising in the country, according to a new report today. Introduced in iOS 14.5, Apple's App Tracking Transparency rules require apps that access an iPhone's ad identifier or IDFA must ask a user's permission before...

Apple is facing increasing pressure to tighten its App Tracking Transparency rules after it was found that third parties are using workarounds to identify users who do not consent to be tracked, according to the Financial Times. Apple rules around App Tracking Transparency, which came into effect as part of iOS 14.5 and iPadOS 14.5, require apps to ask for consent to track users across...

Apple appears to be ironing out a bug that meant some iOS 14.5 users were unable to adjust the "Allow Apps to Request to Track" setting that was rolled out as part of Apple's App Tracking Transparency (ATT) feature. In iOS 14.5, iPadOS 14.5, and tvOS 14.5, ATT requires that apps ask for permission before tracking your activity across other companies' apps and websites for targeted...

Google is facing internal concerns that implementing an Android equivalent of Apple's ATT or App Tracking Transparency framework, which offers iOS and iPadOS users the ability to opt-out of tracking across apps and websites, will hurt its more than $130 billion annual spending budget for ads, according to a new report from The Information. According to the report that cites sources within...

Following an app update, Twitter today began asking users to enable ad tracking under Apple's App Tracking Transparency rules. After updating to version 8.65, which adds Spaces support, Twitter users will begin seeing a popup that asks them to "keep ads relevant" by allowing Twitter to track data from other companies like apps used and websites visited. Tapping "Continue" on the popup...

An early look at an ongoing analysis of Apple's App Tracking Transparency suggests that the vast majority of iPhone users are leaving app tracking disabled since the feature went live on April 26 with the release of iOS 14.5. According to the latest data from analytics firm Flurry, just 4% of ‌iPhone‌ users in the U.S. have actively chosen to opt into app tracking after updating their device ...

As a way to convince users to enable tracking across other apps and websites, Facebook is deploying the tactic of telling users that they must enable tracking as part of the App Tracking Transparency framework in iOS 14.5 if they want to help keep Facebook and Instagram "free of charge." App Tracking Transparency or ATT is the newest privacy feature to come to iPhone and iPad devices as part ...

Starting with the iOS 14.5, iPadOS 14.5, and tvOS 14.5 software updates released this week, apps must ask for permission before tracking your activity across other companies' apps and websites for targeted advertising purposes. On an iPhone or iPad, users can manage tracking permissions on an app-by-app basis in the Settings app under Privacy > Tracking, and there is also an "Allow Apps to...

Apple says that it will ban and reject apps on the App Store that attempt to offer users monetary incentives to enable tracking through App Tracking Transparency (ATT), one of many measures the company is taking to ensure developers follow through with the new framework. Yesterday the Cupertino tech giant released iOS and iPadOS 14.5 with several headlining features, including ATT. ATT is a...

Now that iOS 14.5 is available to the public, App Tracking Transparency is being enforced by Apple. Developers are no longer able to access the advertising identifier of your iPhone, iPad, or Apple TV without your express permission, which will prevent developers from tracking you across apps and websites for ad targeting preferences. If that sounds confusing, Apple has created an App...

With Apple now enforcing its App Tracking Transparency rules with the release of iOS 14.5, The Wall Street Journal's Joanna Stern did an interview with Apple software engineering chief Craig Federighi to talk about Apple's aim with the feature and how it works. For those unfamiliar with App Tracking Transparency, it requires app developers to get express user permission before accessing a...