Apple Hit With $116 Million Fine Over App Privacy
▼ Summary
– Italy’s antitrust regulator fined Apple over €98 million for imposing excessively burdensome privacy rules on third-party app developers.
– The fine targets Apple’s App Tracking Transparency policy, which requires third-party developers to obtain user consent twice for data tracking, unlike Apple’s own apps.
– The regulator stated this double consent requirement reduced user consent rates for advertising profiling, harming developers reliant on ad revenue.
– Apple was previously fined by France’s competition authority in March for similar concerns regarding its ATT system.
– Apple strongly disagrees with the Italian decision, plans to appeal, and reaffirms its commitment to strong privacy protections.
Italy’s antitrust regulator has imposed a significant fine on Apple, totaling approximately €98 million or $116 million. The penalty centers on the company’s App Tracking Transparency (ATT) framework, which the Italian Competition Authority (AGCM) deems excessively burdensome and discriminatory against third-party developers. The ruling asserts that Apple leveraged its dominant position in the app marketplace to enforce privacy terms that go beyond legal requirements, placing an unfair disadvantage on external apps compared to Apple’s own native iOS applications.
The core of the dispute involves the ATT policy’s consent mechanism, introduced in 2021. While Apple’s first-party apps can secure user permission for data tracking with a single prompt, third-party developers are mandated to obtain consent twice. This process requires users to approve tracking both within the app and again through a system-level prompt. The AGCM found that this double consent requirement led to a measurable drop in user opt-in rates for advertising profiling. Consequently, developers who rely on personalized ad revenue have suffered commercial harm due to this disparity.
According to the regulator’s announcement, Apple imposed these terms unilaterally, negatively impacting its commercial partners. The authority concluded that the policy is disproportionate, arguing that equivalent privacy protection for users could have been achieved by allowing third-party apps to gather consent in a single step, just as Apple’s apps do. This decision is not an isolated event. Earlier this year, French competition authorities fined Apple $162.4 million over similar concerns regarding the ATT system’s competitive effects.
In response to the Italian fine, Apple has stated it strongly disagrees with the AGCM’s findings and plans to appeal the decision. The company reiterated its commitment to defending what it describes as strong privacy protections for its users. This ongoing conflict highlights the tension between privacy initiatives and fair competition in the digital ecosystem, as regulators increasingly scrutinize how platform owners set the rules for the developers operating within their walls.
(Source: The Verge)
