Apple has published a new page on its developer portal and announced that it’s delaying the iOS 14 anti-tracking feature that mandates apps to ask for permission before tracking users across apps and websites owned by other companies.
The feature isn’t taken positively by many, including Facebook, whose Audience Network platform depends on data collection and tracking.
Facebook recently published a blog post to acknowledge the issue saying it will hurt publisher revenue and even went on to say that it may withdraw Audience Network from iOS 14 devices if the situation doesn’t get fixed.
Speaking of Apple, the Cupertino giant said that it’d start rolling out the feature from early 2021. This is to give developers sufficient 1time to make the required changes to their apps.
The said feature allows users to either accept or decline when an app requests for IDFA (Identifiers for Advertisers) code that allows ads to be personalized by tracking their activity across apps and services. The apps will also have to inform users why they are being tracked when asking for permission.
While the feature doesn’t harm advertisers directly, the possibility of a user declining the request has made it a topic of concern. And those changes could be on the higher side as privacy is a hot topic in today’s time.
In addition to the iOS 14 privacy features, Apple has also asked developers to disclose their app’s privacy practices via a new privacy information section that will be created on an app’s product page.
Apple says developers will be able to submit relevant information by the end of next month, and the privacy section will roll out by the end of the year.
