Apple Could Disable App Tracking in Europe
▼ Summary
– Apple may disable its App Tracking Transparency feature in Europe due to intense lobbying efforts, claiming this would harm European consumers.
– App Tracking Transparency, introduced in May 2021, allows users to control whether apps can track their activity across other apps and websites for advertising.
– The feature led to a significant decline in cross-app and cross-site tracking, with one study reporting a 54.7% drop in tracking rates in the United States.
– Regulators in Germany and France have accused Apple of anticompetitive behavior with ATT, alleging Apple applies different privacy standards to its own apps.
– Apple denies the anticompetitiveness allegations, stating it holds itself to higher privacy standards and cannot link data across its own services like Siri and Maps.
Apple has indicated it might disable its App Tracking Transparency feature for users in Europe, citing what it describes as “intense lobbying efforts” by certain groups. This potential move could significantly alter the digital privacy landscape for millions of European consumers, who currently have the power to decide whether apps can monitor their online behavior across different platforms.
App Tracking Transparency, or ATT, first launched by Apple in May 2021, gives iPhone and iPad users a clear choice: they can permit or deny apps from tracking their activity across other companies’ apps and websites. This data is often used for targeted advertising or shared with third-party data brokers. Following its introduction, studies showed a dramatic reduction in cross-app and cross-site tracking. One report highlighted a drop of over 54% in tracking rates within the United States alone.
The advertising industry felt the impact of this change immediately, though the effect was somewhat limited. Major players like Meta reportedly developed methods to work around the restrictions, helping to sustain their advertising performance metrics. Meanwhile, other companies and industry associations chose a different path, filing legal challenges and complaints with regulators. They argue that Apple’s implementation of ATT represents anticompetitive behavior.
Apple recently stated to the German Press Agency that “intense lobbying efforts in Germany, Italy, and other European nations may compel us to remove this feature, which would be to the detriment of European consumers.” The company expressed its intention to continue urging authorities across Europe to allow Apple to keep offering what it calls a vital privacy tool.
In Germany, the Federal Cartel Office issued a preliminary assessment this year suggesting that ATT could be anticompetitive. Regulators pointed to allegations that Apple does not hold its own first-party apps to the same strict privacy standards it imposes on external developers. Separately, French authorities fined Apple several months ago concerning its ATT policies.
Apple has consistently denied these anticompetitive claims. The company asserts that it holds itself to a higher standard than it requires of third-party developers. Apple provides users with an explicit choice about whether they want personalized ads at all, and it has engineered services like Siri, Maps, FaceTime, and iMessage in such a way that data cannot be linked across these platforms, even if the company wanted to do so.
Despite these arguments, regulatory bodies remain unconvinced. Apple is now taking a more assertive public stance, framing the conflict as a battle driven by lobbyists aiming to protect advertiser interests and ad-supported business models, rather than safeguarding the privacy of European users. This perspective has found support from privacy advocacy organizations, including the Electronic Privacy Information Center.
What are your thoughts on this situation? Do you believe Apple adheres to its own ATT rules, or does it find ways to bypass them? Share your opinion in the comments section below.
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(Source: 9to5Mac)
