2 ms·

TLDR: iOS is a compulsory ad delivery platform.

MBCook 8y ago
TLDR: Apple has told people not to play DNS/tunnel games, you need to use their privacy protecting ad blocking infrastructure. AdGuard didn’t, so Apple stopped them. Absolutely no surprise here.
- crispinb 8y ago
  The rules are designed to enforce the delivery of ads. I agree on the no surprise aspect. Adguard allowed users to expunge ads, Apple has many policies to prevent ceding such control to mere consumers.
  - MBCook 8y ago
    Apple provides an ad blocking framework. It was s big feature 2 years ago. How is that ‘enforcing the delivery of ads?’ Because you can’t block ads in apps, only the web? Any DNS based blocker could trivially track much of what you do both browsing and in apps. And that’s the kind of privacy risk Apple tends to try to fix.
    - mirimir 8y ago
      Personally, I worry more about the ads than about the blocker.
  - manigandham 8y ago
    Apple built ad/content blocking into Safari itself, encouraged its use, and has been waging war on third-party cookies and other tracking for years. This is the exact opposite of "enforcing ads".
    - untog 8y ago
      ...in the browser, yes. But not in apps, which is the distinction for the app in question.
    - crispinb 8y ago
      Not really - it's eliminating competition. Apple is stopping competitors (web apps) from displaying any ads, and enforcing ads through the channel (App Store apps) it profits from.
      - scarface74 8y ago
        I have a better way to block ads. I either pay for the no ads version and support the developer or delete an app that doesn’t have a no ads option. Except for Overcast. You can pay for s no ads version but I find ads for podcast based on the category of podcasts I’m listening to useful.
        crispinb 8y ago
        Seems like a reasonable personal story about how you use an ad-delivery platform like iOS (and is pretty close to what I do on all the platforms I use). But it has little to do with the rightness or otherwise of disallowing users from deciding which network connections their own device is permitted to attempt.
        scarface74 8y ago
        I am controlling what ads I see - I have an ad blocker that works in both the web browser and my RSS reader - ad blockers work in embedded SafariViewControllers - and I don’t bother with apps that don’t give me an option to remove ads. But using a third party VPN that intercepts all of your internet traffic to protect your privacy seems like it’s defeating the purpose. Especially seeing that third party content blockers on iOS have no access to your web browsing history.
    - vuln 8y ago
      You act as if apple blocks their own ads. ProTip: They don't. They want to keep you in that walled garden on that phone you leased and don't even have root on. Jokes on us.
  - saagarjha 8y ago
    I think the intent here was to stop an application from having access to all browser traffic for a purpose by bending the rules of system API (namely, that you should be using this to make a VPN).
chipotle_coyote 8y ago
I think it's way more complicated than this sort of snark makes it out to be. Apple allows content blocking in Mobile Safari. There are some limits to the APIs they've provided, and one can quibble about how complete they are, but Apple has literally made an ad-blocking API. AdGuard Pro's "local VPN" trick was basically a way to be able to block not only ads in Safari, but ads everywhere, including applications that are connecting to ad networks. And I'm pretty sure this is what Apple is ultimately trying to stop here. You can argue that ads are just absolute evil everywhere and that the distinction between in-app ads and web ads is arbitrary. And, I guess, maybe? Maybe we should have the absolute right, as the device owner, to say to app developers, "Hey, if you were stupid enough to make this app free and try to get money from it by showing me ads, tough cookies for you." But, as the device owner, you also have the absolute right to, well, choose what apps you run, in a way that really isn't true for web sites. I mean, yes, you have the choice of which web sites you visit, but in practice it's way harder to say "if you don't like web sites with horrible, intrusive ads, just don't visit them" than it is to say "if you don't like ad-supported apps, don't download them." And while this is absolutely a subjective perception that may apply only to me and no one else, it would feel just a little bit sleazy to me to use an ad-supported app for free while blocking the ads. If I like the app, I'll pay to make the ads go away if that's an option; if the ads can't be turned off and they're too intrusive, I'll simply stop using the app.
- mirimir 8y ago
  As "the device owner, [I] also have the absolute right" to control what the device does, what traffic it accepts, and what it rejects. And as much as I like Apple's stance on privacy and security, I hate its refusal to honor owners' rights. So I'd never use their stuff.
  - s73v3r_ 8y ago
    Then don't use apps that are ad supported? That sounds like the way to make sure that you're controlling what traffic it's using. Not denying apps that you're using revenue.
    - 8y ago

TLDR: Apple has told people not to play DNS/tunnel games, you need to use their privacy protecting ad blocking infrastructure. AdGuard didn’t, so Apple stopped them. Absolutely no surprise here.

crispinb 8y ago
The rules are designed to enforce the delivery of ads. I agree on the no surprise aspect. Adguard allowed users to expunge ads, Apple has many policies to prevent ceding such control to mere consumers.
- MBCook 8y ago
  Apple provides an ad blocking framework. It was s big feature 2 years ago. How is that ‘enforcing the delivery of ads?’ Because you can’t block ads in apps, only the web? Any DNS based blocker could trivially track much of what you do both browsing and in apps. And that’s the kind of privacy risk Apple tends to try to fix.
  - mirimir 8y ago
    Personally, I worry more about the ads than about the blocker.
- manigandham 8y ago
  Apple built ad/content blocking into Safari itself, encouraged its use, and has been waging war on third-party cookies and other tracking for years. This is the exact opposite of "enforcing ads".
  - untog 8y ago
    ...in the browser, yes. But not in apps, which is the distinction for the app in question.
  - crispinb 8y ago
    Not really - it's eliminating competition. Apple is stopping competitors (web apps) from displaying any ads, and enforcing ads through the channel (App Store apps) it profits from.
    - scarface74 8y ago
      I have a better way to block ads. I either pay for the no ads version and support the developer or delete an app that doesn’t have a no ads option. Except for Overcast. You can pay for s no ads version but I find ads for podcast based on the category of podcasts I’m listening to useful.
      - crispinb 8y ago
        Seems like a reasonable personal story about how you use an ad-delivery platform like iOS (and is pretty close to what I do on all the platforms I use). But it has little to do with the rightness or otherwise of disallowing users from deciding which network connections their own device is permitted to attempt.
        scarface74 8y ago
        I am controlling what ads I see - I have an ad blocker that works in both the web browser and my RSS reader - ad blockers work in embedded SafariViewControllers - and I don’t bother with apps that don’t give me an option to remove ads. But using a third party VPN that intercepts all of your internet traffic to protect your privacy seems like it’s defeating the purpose. Especially seeing that third party content blockers on iOS have no access to your web browsing history.
  - vuln 8y ago
    You act as if apple blocks their own ads. ProTip: They don't. They want to keep you in that walled garden on that phone you leased and don't even have root on. Jokes on us.
- saagarjha 8y ago
  I think the intent here was to stop an application from having access to all browser traffic for a purpose by bending the rules of system API (namely, that you should be using this to make a VPN).

chipotle_coyote 8y ago

I think it's way more complicated than this sort of snark makes it out to be. Apple allows content blocking in Mobile Safari. There are some limits to the APIs they've provided, and one can quibble about how complete they are, but Apple has literally made an ad-blocking API. AdGuard Pro's "local VPN" trick was basically a way to be able to block not only ads in Safari, but ads everywhere, including applications that are connecting to ad networks. And I'm pretty sure this is what Apple is ultimately trying to stop here. You can argue that ads are just absolute evil everywhere and that the distinction between in-app ads and web ads is arbitrary. And, I guess, maybe? Maybe we should have the absolute right, as the device owner, to say to app developers, "Hey, if you were stupid enough to make this app free and try to get money from it by showing me ads, tough cookies for you." But, as the device owner, you also have the absolute right to, well, choose what apps you run, in a way that really isn't true for web sites. I mean, yes, you have the choice of which web sites you visit, but in practice it's way harder to say "if you don't like web sites with horrible, intrusive ads, just don't visit them" than it is to say "if you don't like ad-supported apps, don't download them." And while this is absolutely a subjective perception that may apply only to me and no one else, it would feel just a little bit sleazy to me to use an ad-supported app for free while blocking the ads. If I like the app, I'll pay to make the ads go away if that's an option; if the ads can't be turned off and they're too intrusive, I'll simply stop using the app.

mirimir 8y ago
As "the device owner, [I] also have the absolute right" to control what the device does, what traffic it accepts, and what it rejects. And as much as I like Apple's stance on privacy and security, I hate its refusal to honor owners' rights. So I'd never use their stuff.
- s73v3r_ 8y ago
  Then don't use apps that are ad supported? That sounds like the way to make sure that you're controlling what traffic it's using. Not denying apps that you're using revenue.
  - 8y ago