Strange for a page espousing anti-tracking [0] to load media in from apple.com. Granted Mozilla's page [1] is even a worse offender with google-analytics and newrelic embeds.
Really makes you think what really drives the underlying narrative for such initiatives at corporates if not sabotaging competitors? OpenDNS founder, u/davidu, pointed out that DNS over HTTPS, something that takes aim at trackers and advocates privacy, also, in fact, had support of BigAdTech [2].
The content blocker ecosystem has been fighting the dragnet for a long time without expecting anything in return save for examples like Brave and Adblock. It'd be a shame to see those subject to embrace, extend, extinguish.
> And we will create new web technologies to re-enable specific non-harmful practices without reintroducing tracking capabilities.
I wonder what this means. Another standard that AdTech can rally behind? Or, Apple's way of wrestling control away from AdTech? Remember, not long ago Apple disallowed 3p browsers for a long time, on AppStore...and they are likely going to act as gate-keepers here, as well?
> we will typically prioritize user benefits over preserving current website practices. We believe that that is the role of a web browser, also known as the user agent.
Where have I heard that before? [3]
And now... what about apps on AppStore? When do we get anti-tracking measures there? Pretty soon, would be really great, because that's a present and clear danger, in my eyes, wrt privacy... but one that hurts Apple's bottomline?
Safari with ITP enabled blocks cookies on those font-related resources. But because of other browsers, it's not very nice to send cookies on those resources in the first place.
Thanks for taking time to reply. You've engaged with folks in this thread admirably and that makes me think the effort at curbing prevelant tracking is genuine... just that trusting BigTech with privacy has gotten a lot difficult over the years.
I'd wish Apple encouraged a secure plugin based ecosystem to flourish in the AppStore, so that folks could write content blockers that block apps from doing as they please [0]. I understand the security implications (for healthcare and financial apps, for instance) and the ability to get this right in face of spyware but in my own naïve way I feel this a decisive way to signal the intent that Apple is a privacy-first company.
[0] With VPNs a lot of content can be blocked already, but that's at the network level. It'd be great to have something at the runtime level, like WebKit here is trying to do.
The App Store requires apps to obtain user consent before doing any kind of tracking and only allows one method of identifying users (advertising ID), which the user can reset whenever they feel that apps are getting too creepy with their tracking. While there have been other ways to fingerprint users, Apple has been aggressively pursuing each avenue and closing them off.
> Apple has been aggressively pursuing each avenue and closing them off.
That is key. It is all Apple.
VPNs can be a powerful mechanism too, and you can see third party VPNs come up with solutions that are way more aggressive at blocking trackers than Apple [0]. And from what I know, Apple makes it hard for such VPN apps to flourish. Not long ago, they kicked Adguard and Malwarebytes out [1] (though they now let them back in).
The problem with VPNs is that while they can enable privacy on a deeper level than Apple can in some cases, they also potentially pose a grave threat, as seen with Facebook’s “research” VPN which got shuttered not so long ago.
It’s a tough problem because there’s no way to verify what’s happening on the other end of the VPN during the app review process, and even if there were its too easy to change how the VPN operates to pass review and then flip it back afterwards.
Really makes you think what really drives the underlying narrative for such initiatives at corporates if not sabotaging competitors? OpenDNS founder, u/davidu, pointed out that DNS over HTTPS, something that takes aim at trackers and advocates privacy, also, in fact, had support of BigAdTech [2].
The content blocker ecosystem has been fighting the dragnet for a long time without expecting anything in return save for examples like Brave and Adblock. It'd be a shame to see those subject to embrace, extend, extinguish.
> And we will create new web technologies to re-enable specific non-harmful practices without reintroducing tracking capabilities.
I wonder what this means. Another standard that AdTech can rally behind? Or, Apple's way of wrestling control away from AdTech? Remember, not long ago Apple disallowed 3p browsers for a long time, on AppStore...and they are likely going to act as gate-keepers here, as well?
> we will typically prioritize user benefits over preserving current website practices. We believe that that is the role of a web browser, also known as the user agent.
Where have I heard that before? [3]
And now... what about apps on AppStore? When do we get anti-tracking measures there? Pretty soon, would be really great, because that's a present and clear danger, in my eyes, wrt privacy... but one that hurts Apple's bottomline?
[0] https://webkit.org/tracking-prevention-policy/
[1] https://wiki.mozilla.org/Security/Anti_tracking_policy
[2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18257318
[3] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20542656