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iOS 13 app tracking alert has dramatically cut location data flow to ad industry

781 points by clairity 7y ago

lalos 7y ago
Next step is to download Lockdown, open source and on device firewall. It also offers a VPN with an in-app purchase (kinda confusing when you are setting it up), but for free you get the firewall only. Easy to enable and block known ad-trackers (including FB sdk and Google Ads). Highly recommend. It's also made by ex Apple engineers, in case that helps for building trustworthiness. https://apps.apple.com/us/app/lockdown-apps/id1469783711 https://apps.apple.com/us/app/lockdown-apps/id1469783711 https://github.com/confirmedcode/lockdown-ios https://github.com/confirmedcode/lockdown-ios
- uyuioi 7y ago
  Just downloaded this to see. It has a log which within a minute blocked 6 ad networks. Great.
- cremp 7y ago
  Maybe I'm just skeptical and a cynic, but... > VPN with an in-app purchase Lets pay for a product, and they have the ability to sell that data. I get, acting like a pi-hole and what-not but, a VPN for that task seems overkill.
  - mikestew 7y ago
    VPN for that task seems overkill If you can figure out another way to pull it off, I’d wager you could make a fair bit of cash. Or at least get a job offer at a lot of places you might like to work.
  - Karupan 7y ago
    > a VPN for that task seems overkill I think that’s the only way to perform certain tasks on iOS.
  - tehlike 7y ago
    Vpn is the ux reason. It is the only way to have a way to inspect network traffic on android without rooting. And likely on ios. Disclaimer: never used lockdown, not endorsing the product.
  - Cynddl 7y ago
    iOS requires a VPN profile (even a local VPN) for ruled-based adblocking. This is what AdGuard Pro [0] does for adblocking. This does not mean that your data goes through a VPN server. [0] https://adguard.com/en/adguard-ios-pro/overview.html https://adguard.com/en/adguard-ios-pro/overview.html
  - lalos 7y ago
    The VPN is optional purchase. I mentioned it since the setup is a bit misleading. The DNS blocking is free and on-device and available to run after skipping the VPN part. Pi-hole is harder to get right with a mobile device on the go unless you are hosting on your server. This is basically an app with a subset of features of pi-hole. iOS is very restrictive and to enable the on-device firewall you do need to use the VPN functionality but you can check the VPN profile it installs that references 127.0.0.1.
- scarface74 7y ago
  So if I care about privacy, why in the heck would I trust yet another party with access to all of my internet communication?
  - p49k 7y ago
    It has one of the best privacy policies I’ve ever read. “ Everything Lockdown Firewall does stays on your phone, so no data is transmitted to any of our servers. This can be confirmed by checking the source code, which is 100% open and public for anyone to examine. Lockdown Firewall doesn't use any type of third party analytics, trackers, or APIs, so there's no risk of your data leaking to third parties. This means there's no Google Analytics, no Facebook Pixel, no Mixpanel, Fabric, Mailchimp, etc — nada. Information We Collect Lockdown Firewall collects nothing. It all stays on your device.”
  - lalos 7y ago
    It runs on device and it's fairly easy to analyze the traffic, you are not giving a third party all your access. You could proxy all the traffic through a Mac running LittleSnitch, read their code, inspect the VPN profile it installs on the device, etc. It will only have access to your internet traffic if you opt-in in the actual VPN tunnel service they sell, which is optional.
- mikestew 7y ago
  Just downloaded it, too. It does ferret out those ads in the NYT app that I can’t seem to get Pi-Hole to filter out. Seems it will save me setting up a VPN to the home network to use Pi-Hole when on the road, too. So far, it’s two thumbs up. I’ll give it a few days, but I’ll throw some money their way in-app purchase even I never use their VPN (though I’ll certainly give it a whirl).
  - Terretta 7y ago
    If you like Pi-hole, consider nextdns.io and their iOS app, or their plenty other configs/apps as well. Using the web control panel, pick from high level categories to block, or drill down and select from among the most common of dozens and dozens of block lists. Make one or more configs, so different family members or devices can be blocked differently. With Lightweight apps for Android, iOS, Windows, macOS and Chrome OS offering privacy and security benefits of DNS-over-HTTPS. Always-on on all networks automatically to automatically bypass network filtering and government censorship. Their DNS hosts leverage latency-based routing to automatically use the DNS server with the lowest latency, or use a subset outside "Five eyes" locations. https://nextdns.io https://nextdns.io
    - mikestew 7y ago
      Thanks for the heads-up, definitely interesting enough to take a look.
- DavideNL 7y ago
  This app is not a firewall, it's a 'DNS sinkhole'. Any app can easily circumvent this "firewall" by simply falling back to hard coded public ips of their servers if the domain lookup doesn't work. I'm not saying it's a bad app, but it's misleading to call their app a "firewall".
  - lalos 7y ago
    True, firewall is for inbound connection. Thanks.
    - laumars 7y ago
      firewalls are for both inbound and outbound connections. The GP's point is this isn't blocking network connections because you can still access the end point via IP. What this is doing is redirecting known domain names to a sink hole. Much like Pihole does.
- saagarjha 7y ago
  > It's also made by ex Apple engineers, in case that helps for building trustworthiness. It really shouldn't. Plenty of Apple engineers leave the company to work on shady things.
mikestew 7y ago
And it’s not just location data. I am amazed at how many apps want Bluetooth, too. Umm, there isn’t a single listed feature that indicates a need for BT, why are you asking? Oh, so you can use that as a tracking vector, too. Well, not only do you not get BT, you don’t get to live on my phone anymore, either. As for the advertisers, boo-hoo. You raised a finger (or two, depending on locale) to “do not track”, you think there wasn’t a hammer that was going to fall after you were asked politely?
- ASalazarMX 7y ago
  Would the situation be different if Apple's biggest rival wasn't basically an advertising and data mining company? I wouldn't put it below Apple to profit from advertising control if Google didn't have an iron grip on it.
  - mikestew 7y ago
    And if a frog had wings it wouldn’t bump its ass when it hops. But in our world of ass-bumping frogs, that is our current situation. Beyond that, we’re guessing at motives from Column A, and hypotheticals from Column B.
    - mobilemidget 7y ago
      Heh! :D I never heard frog/wings phrase before, made me laugh. This frog probably did though, saw bit on tv last week, and thanks to the old data miner (google searched it). https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/amphibians/w/wallaces-flying-frog/ https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/amphibians/w/wall... I prematurely agree, it's not real wings, but bumps its ass a lot less compared to other frogs.
  - chipperyman573 7y ago
    Isn't that good? Now their goals naturally align with ours. That means these ideals will outlast CEOs (at least until one of the CEOs decides Google doesn't matter any more...)
  - 7y ago
mesozoic 7y ago
Great step in the right direction.
dpkonofa 7y ago
My favorite thing about these features is the number of apps that it’s reminded me to uninstall completely from my devices. The number of apps that I initially installed months ago that didn’t have any of this that suddenly developed tracking notifications is staggering. I never would have known either since the updates happen silently in the background. Great features.
- ChrisMarshallNY 7y ago
  This. Yeah, I have a number of apps I installed for one-time operations (a number of obscure dev apps come to mind), and I find out that they are still hanging around, like my drunken Uncle Bob, hovering around the keg.
- misiti3780 7y ago
  where are you seeing the notifications ? I installed the update and just clicked "use location only while using app" for everything
  - afturner 7y ago
    They just magically start appearing after a while
    - 8fingerlouie 7y ago
      And once they start they don't stop again, which is also kinda annoying. I wish there was some way to permanently allow it, and not be bugged by the alerts again. Something the app cannot set by itself, but i can set. I have some apps, i.e. Unifi Protect, that requires access to background location to send activity alerts when nobody is home, and i frequently get alerts that this app has used my location in the background, and despite selecting "allow always" it will pop up again in a couple of weeks. To further add insult to injury, i appear to have "trained" my wife so well that she defaults to selecting "deny" for apps she doesn't use, and "only when in use" to everything else, which then results in a flurry of motion alerts :)
novok 7y ago
The alert is annoying although for apps you want to have always on location tracking although, like some life logging apps. (Arc, etc) It's like OS doesn't want to accept there are apps you want always on location tracking on and for it to stop annoying you about it.
- duskwuff 7y ago
  Yeah, I'm a little annoyed that there isn't an option for "no really, always allow". I understand that there's good privacy reasons to keep asking -- but I'm quite aware that a weather app will need access to my location, and I'm okay with that.
  - foogazi 7y ago
    Wonder if we’ll see a shift to legit location aware apps that then leak tracking data Are a weather app’s ads more valuable now because it gets more users to track location
  - ac29 7y ago
    That's how it works in Android. Per app, you can set to Always allow location, Always deny location, or Allow only when app is in use.
  - goalieca 7y ago
    You can choose the weather location manually. I have a list of cities and default to the one I live in. There’s absolutely no reason for the weather app to know my location down to the square metre.
    - derefr 7y ago
      When you choose a weather location manually, you actually get a less fine-grained report than the one you get from a GPS-resolved location. Basically, you get weather for "the closest weather station to the geographic centre of the named city" rather than "the closest weather station to you." This can be a big deal if your city has a large altitude range, such that going a few miles east means the difference between clouds vs. fog, or rain vs. snow; or if your city is coastal, such that going a few miles inland can mean rain vs. sun, and can make a dozen degrees' difference in temperature. (And, in some cities, you have both problems. Yay Vancouver!)
hinkley 7y ago
The thing is... we still do adaptations of Shakespeare, because human behavior hasn't changed all that profoundly in 600 years. By the time we actually have privacy again, there will be enough information out there to mine about how people reacted five, ten years ago for the old data to continue to retain value. It'll just be repackaged and re-interpreted over and over again. The coffee shop may no longer know that you also like kayaks, or bulldogs, but they might not need information like that to peg your preferences based on what stereotypes you fit with the information they do have.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
mikeryan 7y ago
Over the years I've considered switching to Android a few times but Apple's really locking in as my preferred device from their privacy work. Not sure this moves the needle with consumers but it does for me.
- jccooper 7y ago
  The article is from Apple Insider, so I guess it's no surprise they don't mention it, but Android 10 has the same functionality, including reminders and per-app 3-way location tracking settings (always on, on with app open, off).
  - merpnderp 7y ago
    Granted it's been quite some time, but one of the reasons I switched to iOS from Android was Facebook kept "accidentally" exploiting bugs in Android and Google never did anything about it. At the time Facebook wasn't even one of the apps you could delete from your phone. Hopefully Android is better now.
    - tialaramex 7y ago
      > one of the reasons I switched to iOS from Android was Facebook kept "accidentally" exploiting bugs in Android and Google never did anything about it. At the time Facebook wasn't even one of the apps you could delete from your phone. Hopefully Android is better now Um? What? None of my Android phones, going back a great many years, had Facebook. So sure, I couldn't delete it - because it wasn't there.
      - fierarul 7y ago
        My guess is you buy expensive/vanilla-OS Android phones. Lots of other Android phones have Facebook apps that can't be deleted.
        Krasnol 7y ago
        The cheapest western Android phones like by Motorola, Nokia or Xiaomi (the around 150€ models) don't have this and you can uninstall everything that IS on there. Actually the expansive ones like Samsung are the really bloated ones.
freehunter 7y ago
On the other hand Apple has forced apps to use location data for purposes it should not be used for. Termius, for example, is my favorite iOS SSH app. But according to them, they can’t keep an SSH session running in the background unless they’re constantly tracking your location data. And somehow Apple approved this usage of location data. I don’t want to give Termius my location. I don’t want them tracking me everywhere I go. But apparently that’s the only way they can keep my SSH session alive when I need to switch to Safari for a few minutes?
- layoutIfNeeded 7y ago
  Termius is lying. They could just as easily played silent audio in the background to keep the app from being suspended. Although in my opinion both practices should cause them to be rejected from the AppStore since they’re clearly misusing the APIs. Must be an oversight from the review team at Apple.
  - lern_too_spel 7y ago
    That option would mean the user couldn't listen to other audio in the background.
    - ryandrake 7y ago
      Apple’s reviewers try to distinguish between apps that legitimately need to play audio in the background and apps whose use cases have nothing to do with audio (or location) and are likely using the APIs to work around the rules.
- SlowRobotAhead 7y ago
  >And somehow Apple approved this usage of location data. On one hand I agree with you, that's crazy that your SSH program put that limit on there for clearly tracking purposes. But I guess I sort of disagree this is Apple's problem to solve. It's yours. Apple made the changes to inform and educate you the customer that an app that is abusing your trust. The solution is not to force Apple to police developers but for you to stop using Terminus. Call it a free market solution if you like. The difference with real and ideal is that Terminus could absolutely find a "legitimate" use for location and it would scoot right by Apple review anyhow. So let them be upfront they're bad people being bad. (Before it comes... I KNOW... Apple walled garden and how they do this a lot anyhow! But, as someone who has walled garden issues with Apple, we should encourage information and education over big brother protecting us. It might not be consistent for them, but I think it's the right move here)
tomlockwood 7y ago
> A drop in advertiser spending is likely to occur from small or medium-sized advertisers, Kasamias believes, as they are clients "where cost efficiency is paramount and there is a physical footprint, as targeting the right user at the right time will become more difficult." Frankly, what a load of horse shit. The reason for the drop in spend isn't the lack of targeting potential. Ad companies talk about this, because it sounds less creepy than what's really going on. What marketing departments in companies want from location data, is the ability to attribute sales to campaigns. They carpet bomb everyone they can with ads, and then if someone coincidentally even brushes past a store on their commute, they claim that the customer visited a store. It's absolute arcane crap. They have no incentive to make targeting better if tracking is pervasive, because they can wildly gesticulate at one datapoint that slimily suggests the customer was effected by the ad. Losing location tracking data reduces the effectiveness of attribution, for huge enterprises, who target everyone. ed: I wrote a little blog about this in June - https://lockwood.dev/advertising/2019/06/07/adtech-sucks.html https://lockwood.dev/advertising/2019/06/07/adtech-sucks.htm...
- aaronharnly 7y ago
  Thanks for the blog post, for the thoughts yes, but also for teaching me the word “spruik”! PS I hope you’ve found or are finding a new and rewarding area to work in.
  - rpastuszak 7y ago
    Same here. I'm in a similar situation to yours when you published that post. Curious to see what did you do next.
    - tomlockwood 7y ago
      Thanks for your kind words :) I shifted my career into web dev, and got a bit more picky with the companies I applied to work for. I feel much better about my work now. You'll find something!!!
- ec109685 7y ago
bhouston 7y ago
My Android phone started telling me about background location requests about 2 weeks ago as well with the option to block. It is a great feature.
Waterluvian 7y ago
I'm probably saying the complete obvious, but Apple can completely crush Google if they execute this angle properly. Google has no choice but to support ads. They're an ad company. Apple has to keep hammering how bad the ad and privacy experiences are with Android. Make iOS an absolute delight to use in contrast. I'd pay a premium for that. Android has done a great job making me want an iOS device again, these last ten years.
- hyperbovine 7y ago
  Of course they have a choice: charge money for the services they provide. Revolutionary concept, I know.
  - ojame 7y ago
    What services are you thinking of? They charge for all the enterprise level stuff, and Google Cloud etc; but consumer facing every-day use services? I can't see how charging for search would work, charging for Android, they already charge for handsets but it's easier for Apple because of a closed ecosystem, I doubt they could charge for Chrome, so I'm a bit confused.
    - Spooky23 7y ago
      They could charge for search gold edition with fewer ads and more sophisticated operators, or buy companies like LexisNexis or other subscription options. Ads are an incredible cash cow and an amazing business, but there are all sorts of other ways to monetize that business.
  - ogre_codes 7y ago
    Charge for search? For maps? Gmail? How's that going to work when you get it for free from everyone else? The entire reason Google's products are as big/ successful as they are is because they are free. If they started charging for Gmail, the rush to the exits would be instant. If Google started charging for Android OEMs would switch to AOSP, China, Amazon, and Microsoft would ensure a supply of free Android versions. Apple is able to charge people for their services more-or-less up-front. Google has to wrangle fickle OEMs.
JohnFen 7y ago
Excellent work, Apple! Keep it up!
shivam_mani 7y ago
That's great. Android also has this feature for couple of months now. What's great it shows list of apps that use location in background so that you can disable all permissions in go.
code4tee 7y ago
Apple is clearly taking a position that some of the other big players can’t, and all indications are that they will squeeze this play very hard. The likes of Google have rough waters ahead. Advertising on the internet is obviously here to say but the future of targeted ads based on all this tracking data is clearly looking very shaky. Google and other companies have likely not done enough to diversify their business models to weather the coming storm without a lot of hurt.
xs83 7y ago
As someone who works in this space I see this from an alternative angle. Yes we use data like this in order to advertise to you, No Apple is no better than Google at how they approach this - they are just walling you further into their walled garden. Google uses your location information to track your locations in order to provide better (more relevant) advertisements through their own ad platform. Apple does exactly the same but because it doesn't have it's own ad platform this gets sent to their "Approved Partners" who do it on their behalf. Stopping 3rd parties from being able to use this data simply tightens the circle, the data is anonymous (for the most part) and while there are companies that exist out there to tie this data to an actual person most companies like ours have no need to do so. Likewise what you will start seeing off the back of this is a decrease in advert quality. Like anyone - I despise adverts, but if I HAVE to see them I at least want them to be relevant products that I am interested in. Soon the only people who will be able to provide those insights will be Apple Partners or Google.
- egdod 7y ago
  > Apple does exactly the same but because it doesn't have it's own ad platform this gets sent to their "Approved Partners" who do it on their behalf. Apple sends my location information to third parties? Citation needed.
  - macintux 7y ago
    I just looked. They do, but they share it anonymously unless you consent otherwise. https://www.apple.com/legal/privacy/en-ww/ https://www.apple.com/legal/privacy/en-ww/ See "Location-Based Services" near the bottom.
    - xenospn 7y ago
      I'm assuming this is for Maps/address resolution data and such, and not real time location information that can be used to identify a single user.
      - deleted 7y ago
overgard 7y ago
Here’s the thing: before all this privacy invading tracking nonsense advertising was a perfectly healthy business. Yes, it’s harder to know if your campaign worked but that didn’t stop people from advertising. I have zero sympathy for the ad industry complaining because of this.
jammygit 7y ago
What sort of privacy protections does purism offer when you use librem apps? Anyone experiment with this so far?
throwaway55554 7y ago
Replace each occurrence of “location data” with, say, “cocain”. > Despite the reduced amount of cocain available, the amount that is still available to use is more valuable, while the market for cocain continues to thrive. I mean it’s disturbing.
- scarejunba 7y ago
  Hey, good one, mate. Now let's try the First Amendment. I'm going to try replacing "speech" with "cocaine". > Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of cocaine, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances. Good god. This is immeasurably disturbing. Forsooth, we must ban the freedom of speech!
  - throwaway55554 7y ago
    Are you somehow trying to equate ad companies hoovering up our location data with the first amendment? I was simply trying to convey how addicted they are to that data.
    - scarejunba 7y ago
      You can make everyone look addicted to something by replacing something with cocaine. It's because all the bad parts come from the fact that you're replacing something with cocaine
luhn 7y ago
One thing I wish iOS supported is allowing apps to access approximate location data. There's a lot of apps that bring value based on location, but I don't want to give them precise GPS data.
mhb 7y ago
That's swell. It would also be great if there was a single button on the Control Center that would allow me to toggle global location on/off instead of how it is which is multiple clicks, scroll and confirmation.
agra 7y ago
The major carriers sell real time location data, and have repeatedly lied about ending the practice. Sandboxing apps can't solve that problem, only democracy can. https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/qvqgnd/sprint-stop-selling-location-data-tmobile-att-microbilt-zumigo https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/qvqgnd/sprint-stop-sellin... https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/nepxbz/i-gave-a-bounty-hunter-300-dollars-located-phone-MicroBilt-zumigo-tmobile https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/nepxbz/i-gave-a-bounty-hu...
cglong 7y ago
This feature sounds great on paper, but what's always bugged me is that this only applies to third-party apps. Apple's own location tracking apps (Maps, Find My) aren't subjected to never-ending scary pop-up messages like their competitors.
classified 7y ago
> ...forcing advertisers to use inefficient data sources to pinpoint users. They should have said, "to pinpoint users against their will". If the user wanted to be pinpointed, they would allow location tracking in that app.
jonny383 7y ago
If you're running Android, I suggest you install one of the open source "firewall"s available on FDroid. Even if you don't plan on using it, make yourself aware of the sheer number of requests being sent _constantly_ from not only your applications, but by Android system services themselves. I'm not saying these requests are always related to ad tracking, but you can't argue there's a lot of information constantly being sent back an forth. Pro-tip: Your battery life will possibly double running a software firewall on Android...
- n0rbwah 7y ago
  Any app you've got in mind? The only one on https://search.f-droid.org/?q=firewall https://search.f-droid.org/?q=firewall doesn't seem to be of interest for that purpose.
wewake 7y ago
Apple already collects all the data of their users heavily and moves like these are simply meant to annoy their competitors (mostly Google) and keep the data to themselves while looking like a good kid in the valley. The number of gullible people aka Apple fanboys is staggering here who actually think Apple is trying to _save_ their privacy from advertisers after reading this highly biased article. Hah.
- algesten 7y ago
  Any sources for this?
  - terminaljunkid 7y ago
    The blog is one of biggest apple fanboy bullshits out there. And given the bias against google in HN / reddit, it is quite simple why apple is heralded as preserver of privacy. Hell, one can disable most of google stuff and install f-droid, or even go lineageOS route. that's much, much more private than buying an overpriced, locked-in phone. If Google is evil because it tracks some (easily hide-able) data that only few zealots care, then apple is much more evil, because they patent trivial things (such as optional chaining in swift, or rounded corners of phones) and do misleading marketing.
- cerberusss 7y ago
  What makes you so sure about that?
  - wewake 7y ago
    Consider [1] and [2] but you can find plenty more. [1] https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2019/01/apples-hypocritical-defense-data-privacy/581680/ https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2019/01/apple... [2] https://www.forbes.com/sites/kateoflahertyuk/2019/12/04/apple-iphone-11-iphone-11-pro-location-privacy-issue https://www.forbes.com/sites/kateoflahertyuk/2019/12/04/appl...
    - 7y ago
krisgenre 7y ago
To be fair I get a very similar notification when an app requests location data in the background in Android 10 too.
coreai 7y ago
On the other hand recently I restored my iPhone as new. The default settings may give users prompts to disable tracking but Siri is now a big tracker itself. Siri now learns from apps how you use them by default. While this may not be advertising and data may be on your device or with a trusted company like Apple, the idea of privacy should be that by default everything is opt in only. Who’s to say Apple is tailoring your iPhone behaviour ‘to your needs’ when in reality they are just trying to make you invest more into their ecosystem by learning from you ? That might sound like that’s helpful and might make the experience better but the main idea of tracking is still the same.
rpastuszak 7y ago
TL;DR: - 80% of iOS 13 users disabled background location tracking - vendors still report having collected more location-based data than a year before, but - the quality of data has decreased (vendors are ofsetting GPS data with geo ip lookups) I didn't find the UX and the initial permission/notification spam that annoying, as I've learned more about what's happening on my phone. Wondering if this is a shared sentiment or just my bias.
bilekas 7y ago
> The quality of that data is still a problem, as ad buyers notice it is of a lower quality than data that was previously available Not a problem at all.
sigwinch28 7y ago
Although it doesn't stop DNS over HTTPS, I use a DNS sinkhole on my home network and then I use wireguard to VPN into home when I'm not connected to my home WiFi. The Wireguard iOS app allows you to automatically connect to your configured interfaces based on whether you're using cellular data, connected to specific SSIDs, or disconnected from specific SSIDs. The only downside I have found to this approach so far is that it can break captive portals on public WiFi networks, which I will just disconnect from if I have a reasonable 4G signal.

781 points by clairity 7y ago

Next step is to download Lockdown, open source and on device firewall. It also offers a VPN with an in-app purchase (kinda confusing when you are setting it up), but for free you get the firewall only. Easy to enable and block known ad-trackers (including FB sdk and Google Ads). Highly recommend. It's also made by ex Apple engineers, in case that helps for building trustworthiness. https://apps.apple.com/us/app/lockdown-apps/id1469783711 https://apps.apple.com/us/app/lockdown-apps/id1469783711 https://github.com/confirmedcode/lockdown-ios https://github.com/confirmedcode/lockdown-ios

uyuioi 7y ago
Just downloaded this to see. It has a log which within a minute blocked 6 ad networks. Great.
cremp 7y ago
Maybe I'm just skeptical and a cynic, but... > VPN with an in-app purchase Lets pay for a product, and they have the ability to sell that data. I get, acting like a pi-hole and what-not but, a VPN for that task seems overkill.
- mikestew 7y ago
  VPN for that task seems overkill If you can figure out another way to pull it off, I’d wager you could make a fair bit of cash. Or at least get a job offer at a lot of places you might like to work.
- Karupan 7y ago
  > a VPN for that task seems overkill I think that’s the only way to perform certain tasks on iOS.
- tehlike 7y ago
  Vpn is the ux reason. It is the only way to have a way to inspect network traffic on android without rooting. And likely on ios. Disclaimer: never used lockdown, not endorsing the product.
- Cynddl 7y ago
  iOS requires a VPN profile (even a local VPN) for ruled-based adblocking. This is what AdGuard Pro [0] does for adblocking. This does not mean that your data goes through a VPN server. [0] https://adguard.com/en/adguard-ios-pro/overview.html https://adguard.com/en/adguard-ios-pro/overview.html
- lalos 7y ago
  The VPN is optional purchase. I mentioned it since the setup is a bit misleading. The DNS blocking is free and on-device and available to run after skipping the VPN part. Pi-hole is harder to get right with a mobile device on the go unless you are hosting on your server. This is basically an app with a subset of features of pi-hole. iOS is very restrictive and to enable the on-device firewall you do need to use the VPN functionality but you can check the VPN profile it installs that references 127.0.0.1.
scarface74 7y ago
So if I care about privacy, why in the heck would I trust yet another party with access to all of my internet communication?
- p49k 7y ago
  It has one of the best privacy policies I’ve ever read. “ Everything Lockdown Firewall does stays on your phone, so no data is transmitted to any of our servers. This can be confirmed by checking the source code, which is 100% open and public for anyone to examine. Lockdown Firewall doesn't use any type of third party analytics, trackers, or APIs, so there's no risk of your data leaking to third parties. This means there's no Google Analytics, no Facebook Pixel, no Mixpanel, Fabric, Mailchimp, etc — nada. Information We Collect Lockdown Firewall collects nothing. It all stays on your device.”
- lalos 7y ago
  It runs on device and it's fairly easy to analyze the traffic, you are not giving a third party all your access. You could proxy all the traffic through a Mac running LittleSnitch, read their code, inspect the VPN profile it installs on the device, etc. It will only have access to your internet traffic if you opt-in in the actual VPN tunnel service they sell, which is optional.
mikestew 7y ago
Just downloaded it, too. It does ferret out those ads in the NYT app that I can’t seem to get Pi-Hole to filter out. Seems it will save me setting up a VPN to the home network to use Pi-Hole when on the road, too. So far, it’s two thumbs up. I’ll give it a few days, but I’ll throw some money their way in-app purchase even I never use their VPN (though I’ll certainly give it a whirl).
- Terretta 7y ago
  If you like Pi-hole, consider nextdns.io and their iOS app, or their plenty other configs/apps as well. Using the web control panel, pick from high level categories to block, or drill down and select from among the most common of dozens and dozens of block lists. Make one or more configs, so different family members or devices can be blocked differently. With Lightweight apps for Android, iOS, Windows, macOS and Chrome OS offering privacy and security benefits of DNS-over-HTTPS. Always-on on all networks automatically to automatically bypass network filtering and government censorship. Their DNS hosts leverage latency-based routing to automatically use the DNS server with the lowest latency, or use a subset outside "Five eyes" locations. https://nextdns.io https://nextdns.io
  - mikestew 7y ago
    Thanks for the heads-up, definitely interesting enough to take a look.
DavideNL 7y ago
This app is not a firewall, it's a 'DNS sinkhole'. Any app can easily circumvent this "firewall" by simply falling back to hard coded public ips of their servers if the domain lookup doesn't work. I'm not saying it's a bad app, but it's misleading to call their app a "firewall".
- lalos 7y ago
  True, firewall is for inbound connection. Thanks.
  - laumars 7y ago
    firewalls are for both inbound and outbound connections. The GP's point is this isn't blocking network connections because you can still access the end point via IP. What this is doing is redirecting known domain names to a sink hole. Much like Pihole does.
saagarjha 7y ago
> It's also made by ex Apple engineers, in case that helps for building trustworthiness. It really shouldn't. Plenty of Apple engineers leave the company to work on shady things.

mikestew 7y ago

And it’s not just location data. I am amazed at how many apps want Bluetooth, too. Umm, there isn’t a single listed feature that indicates a need for BT, why are you asking? Oh, so you can use that as a tracking vector, too. Well, not only do you not get BT, you don’t get to live on my phone anymore, either. As for the advertisers, boo-hoo. You raised a finger (or two, depending on locale) to “do not track”, you think there wasn’t a hammer that was going to fall after you were asked politely?

ASalazarMX 7y ago
Would the situation be different if Apple's biggest rival wasn't basically an advertising and data mining company? I wouldn't put it below Apple to profit from advertising control if Google didn't have an iron grip on it.
- mikestew 7y ago
  And if a frog had wings it wouldn’t bump its ass when it hops. But in our world of ass-bumping frogs, that is our current situation. Beyond that, we’re guessing at motives from Column A, and hypotheticals from Column B.
  - mobilemidget 7y ago
    Heh! :D I never heard frog/wings phrase before, made me laugh. This frog probably did though, saw bit on tv last week, and thanks to the old data miner (google searched it). https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/amphibians/w/wallaces-flying-frog/ https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/amphibians/w/wall... I prematurely agree, it's not real wings, but bumps its ass a lot less compared to other frogs.
- chipperyman573 7y ago
  Isn't that good? Now their goals naturally align with ours. That means these ideals will outlast CEOs (at least until one of the CEOs decides Google doesn't matter any more...)
- 7y ago

mesozoic 7y ago

Great step in the right direction.

dpkonofa 7y ago

My favorite thing about these features is the number of apps that it’s reminded me to uninstall completely from my devices. The number of apps that I initially installed months ago that didn’t have any of this that suddenly developed tracking notifications is staggering. I never would have known either since the updates happen silently in the background. Great features.

ChrisMarshallNY 7y ago
This. Yeah, I have a number of apps I installed for one-time operations (a number of obscure dev apps come to mind), and I find out that they are still hanging around, like my drunken Uncle Bob, hovering around the keg.
misiti3780 7y ago
where are you seeing the notifications ? I installed the update and just clicked "use location only while using app" for everything
- afturner 7y ago
  They just magically start appearing after a while
  - 8fingerlouie 7y ago
    And once they start they don't stop again, which is also kinda annoying. I wish there was some way to permanently allow it, and not be bugged by the alerts again. Something the app cannot set by itself, but i can set. I have some apps, i.e. Unifi Protect, that requires access to background location to send activity alerts when nobody is home, and i frequently get alerts that this app has used my location in the background, and despite selecting "allow always" it will pop up again in a couple of weeks. To further add insult to injury, i appear to have "trained" my wife so well that she defaults to selecting "deny" for apps she doesn't use, and "only when in use" to everything else, which then results in a flurry of motion alerts :)

novok 7y ago

The alert is annoying although for apps you want to have always on location tracking although, like some life logging apps. (Arc, etc) It's like OS doesn't want to accept there are apps you want always on location tracking on and for it to stop annoying you about it.

duskwuff 7y ago
Yeah, I'm a little annoyed that there isn't an option for "no really, always allow". I understand that there's good privacy reasons to keep asking -- but I'm quite aware that a weather app will need access to my location, and I'm okay with that.
- foogazi 7y ago
  Wonder if we’ll see a shift to legit location aware apps that then leak tracking data Are a weather app’s ads more valuable now because it gets more users to track location
- ac29 7y ago
  That's how it works in Android. Per app, you can set to Always allow location, Always deny location, or Allow only when app is in use.
- goalieca 7y ago
  You can choose the weather location manually. I have a list of cities and default to the one I live in. There’s absolutely no reason for the weather app to know my location down to the square metre.
  - derefr 7y ago
    When you choose a weather location manually, you actually get a less fine-grained report than the one you get from a GPS-resolved location. Basically, you get weather for "the closest weather station to the geographic centre of the named city" rather than "the closest weather station to you." This can be a big deal if your city has a large altitude range, such that going a few miles east means the difference between clouds vs. fog, or rain vs. snow; or if your city is coastal, such that going a few miles inland can mean rain vs. sun, and can make a dozen degrees' difference in temperature. (And, in some cities, you have both problems. Yay Vancouver!)

hinkley 7y ago

The thing is... we still do adaptations of Shakespeare, because human behavior hasn't changed all that profoundly in 600 years. By the time we actually have privacy again, there will be enough information out there to mine about how people reacted five, ten years ago for the old data to continue to retain value. It'll just be repackaged and re-interpreted over and over again. The coffee shop may no longer know that you also like kayaks, or bulldogs, but they might not need information like that to peg your preferences based on what stereotypes you fit with the information they do have.

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

mikeryan 7y ago

Over the years I've considered switching to Android a few times but Apple's really locking in as my preferred device from their privacy work. Not sure this moves the needle with consumers but it does for me.

jccooper 7y ago
The article is from Apple Insider, so I guess it's no surprise they don't mention it, but Android 10 has the same functionality, including reminders and per-app 3-way location tracking settings (always on, on with app open, off).
- merpnderp 7y ago
  Granted it's been quite some time, but one of the reasons I switched to iOS from Android was Facebook kept "accidentally" exploiting bugs in Android and Google never did anything about it. At the time Facebook wasn't even one of the apps you could delete from your phone. Hopefully Android is better now.
  - tialaramex 7y ago
    > one of the reasons I switched to iOS from Android was Facebook kept "accidentally" exploiting bugs in Android and Google never did anything about it. At the time Facebook wasn't even one of the apps you could delete from your phone. Hopefully Android is better now Um? What? None of my Android phones, going back a great many years, had Facebook. So sure, I couldn't delete it - because it wasn't there.
    - fierarul 7y ago
      My guess is you buy expensive/vanilla-OS Android phones. Lots of other Android phones have Facebook apps that can't be deleted.
      - Krasnol 7y ago
        The cheapest western Android phones like by Motorola, Nokia or Xiaomi (the around 150€ models) don't have this and you can uninstall everything that IS on there. Actually the expansive ones like Samsung are the really bloated ones.

freehunter 7y ago

On the other hand Apple has forced apps to use location data for purposes it should not be used for. Termius, for example, is my favorite iOS SSH app. But according to them, they can’t keep an SSH session running in the background unless they’re constantly tracking your location data. And somehow Apple approved this usage of location data. I don’t want to give Termius my location. I don’t want them tracking me everywhere I go. But apparently that’s the only way they can keep my SSH session alive when I need to switch to Safari for a few minutes?

layoutIfNeeded 7y ago
Termius is lying. They could just as easily played silent audio in the background to keep the app from being suspended. Although in my opinion both practices should cause them to be rejected from the AppStore since they’re clearly misusing the APIs. Must be an oversight from the review team at Apple.
- lern_too_spel 7y ago
  That option would mean the user couldn't listen to other audio in the background.
  - ryandrake 7y ago
    Apple’s reviewers try to distinguish between apps that legitimately need to play audio in the background and apps whose use cases have nothing to do with audio (or location) and are likely using the APIs to work around the rules.
SlowRobotAhead 7y ago
>And somehow Apple approved this usage of location data. On one hand I agree with you, that's crazy that your SSH program put that limit on there for clearly tracking purposes. But I guess I sort of disagree this is Apple's problem to solve. It's yours. Apple made the changes to inform and educate you the customer that an app that is abusing your trust. The solution is not to force Apple to police developers but for you to stop using Terminus. Call it a free market solution if you like. The difference with real and ideal is that Terminus could absolutely find a "legitimate" use for location and it would scoot right by Apple review anyhow. So let them be upfront they're bad people being bad. (Before it comes... I KNOW... Apple walled garden and how they do this a lot anyhow! But, as someone who has walled garden issues with Apple, we should encourage information and education over big brother protecting us. It might not be consistent for them, but I think it's the right move here)

tomlockwood 7y ago

> A drop in advertiser spending is likely to occur from small or medium-sized advertisers, Kasamias believes, as they are clients "where cost efficiency is paramount and there is a physical footprint, as targeting the right user at the right time will become more difficult." Frankly, what a load of horse shit. The reason for the drop in spend isn't the lack of targeting potential. Ad companies talk about this, because it sounds less creepy than what's really going on. What marketing departments in companies want from location data, is the ability to attribute sales to campaigns. They carpet bomb everyone they can with ads, and then if someone coincidentally even brushes past a store on their commute, they claim that the customer visited a store. It's absolute arcane crap. They have no incentive to make targeting better if tracking is pervasive, because they can wildly gesticulate at one datapoint that slimily suggests the customer was effected by the ad. Losing location tracking data reduces the effectiveness of attribution, for huge enterprises, who target everyone. ed: I wrote a little blog about this in June - https://lockwood.dev/advertising/2019/06/07/adtech-sucks.html https://lockwood.dev/advertising/2019/06/07/adtech-sucks.htm...

aaronharnly 7y ago
Thanks for the blog post, for the thoughts yes, but also for teaching me the word “spruik”! PS I hope you’ve found or are finding a new and rewarding area to work in.
- rpastuszak 7y ago
  Same here. I'm in a similar situation to yours when you published that post. Curious to see what did you do next.
  - tomlockwood 7y ago
    Thanks for your kind words :) I shifted my career into web dev, and got a bit more picky with the companies I applied to work for. I feel much better about my work now. You'll find something!!!
ec109685 7y ago

bhouston 7y ago

My Android phone started telling me about background location requests about 2 weeks ago as well with the option to block. It is a great feature.

Waterluvian 7y ago

I'm probably saying the complete obvious, but Apple can completely crush Google if they execute this angle properly. Google has no choice but to support ads. They're an ad company. Apple has to keep hammering how bad the ad and privacy experiences are with Android. Make iOS an absolute delight to use in contrast. I'd pay a premium for that. Android has done a great job making me want an iOS device again, these last ten years.

hyperbovine 7y ago
Of course they have a choice: charge money for the services they provide. Revolutionary concept, I know.
- ojame 7y ago
  What services are you thinking of? They charge for all the enterprise level stuff, and Google Cloud etc; but consumer facing every-day use services? I can't see how charging for search would work, charging for Android, they already charge for handsets but it's easier for Apple because of a closed ecosystem, I doubt they could charge for Chrome, so I'm a bit confused.
  - Spooky23 7y ago
    They could charge for search gold edition with fewer ads and more sophisticated operators, or buy companies like LexisNexis or other subscription options. Ads are an incredible cash cow and an amazing business, but there are all sorts of other ways to monetize that business.
- ogre_codes 7y ago
  Charge for search? For maps? Gmail? How's that going to work when you get it for free from everyone else? The entire reason Google's products are as big/ successful as they are is because they are free. If they started charging for Gmail, the rush to the exits would be instant. If Google started charging for Android OEMs would switch to AOSP, China, Amazon, and Microsoft would ensure a supply of free Android versions. Apple is able to charge people for their services more-or-less up-front. Google has to wrangle fickle OEMs.

JohnFen 7y ago

Excellent work, Apple! Keep it up!

shivam_mani 7y ago

That's great. Android also has this feature for couple of months now. What's great it shows list of apps that use location in background so that you can disable all permissions in go.

code4tee 7y ago

Apple is clearly taking a position that some of the other big players can’t, and all indications are that they will squeeze this play very hard. The likes of Google have rough waters ahead. Advertising on the internet is obviously here to say but the future of targeted ads based on all this tracking data is clearly looking very shaky. Google and other companies have likely not done enough to diversify their business models to weather the coming storm without a lot of hurt.

xs83 7y ago

As someone who works in this space I see this from an alternative angle. Yes we use data like this in order to advertise to you, No Apple is no better than Google at how they approach this - they are just walling you further into their walled garden. Google uses your location information to track your locations in order to provide better (more relevant) advertisements through their own ad platform. Apple does exactly the same but because it doesn't have it's own ad platform this gets sent to their "Approved Partners" who do it on their behalf. Stopping 3rd parties from being able to use this data simply tightens the circle, the data is anonymous (for the most part) and while there are companies that exist out there to tie this data to an actual person most companies like ours have no need to do so. Likewise what you will start seeing off the back of this is a decrease in advert quality. Like anyone - I despise adverts, but if I HAVE to see them I at least want them to be relevant products that I am interested in. Soon the only people who will be able to provide those insights will be Apple Partners or Google.

egdod 7y ago
> Apple does exactly the same but because it doesn't have it's own ad platform this gets sent to their "Approved Partners" who do it on their behalf. Apple sends my location information to third parties? Citation needed.
- macintux 7y ago
  I just looked. They do, but they share it anonymously unless you consent otherwise. https://www.apple.com/legal/privacy/en-ww/ https://www.apple.com/legal/privacy/en-ww/ See "Location-Based Services" near the bottom.
  - xenospn 7y ago
    I'm assuming this is for Maps/address resolution data and such, and not real time location information that can be used to identify a single user.
    - deleted 7y ago

overgard 7y ago

Here’s the thing: before all this privacy invading tracking nonsense advertising was a perfectly healthy business. Yes, it’s harder to know if your campaign worked but that didn’t stop people from advertising. I have zero sympathy for the ad industry complaining because of this.

jammygit 7y ago

What sort of privacy protections does purism offer when you use librem apps? Anyone experiment with this so far?

throwaway55554 7y ago

Replace each occurrence of “location data” with, say, “cocain”. > Despite the reduced amount of cocain available, the amount that is still available to use is more valuable, while the market for cocain continues to thrive. I mean it’s disturbing.

scarejunba 7y ago
Hey, good one, mate. Now let's try the First Amendment. I'm going to try replacing "speech" with "cocaine". > Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of cocaine, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances. Good god. This is immeasurably disturbing. Forsooth, we must ban the freedom of speech!
- throwaway55554 7y ago
  Are you somehow trying to equate ad companies hoovering up our location data with the first amendment? I was simply trying to convey how addicted they are to that data.
  - scarejunba 7y ago
    You can make everyone look addicted to something by replacing something with cocaine. It's because all the bad parts come from the fact that you're replacing something with cocaine

luhn 7y ago

One thing I wish iOS supported is allowing apps to access approximate location data. There's a lot of apps that bring value based on location, but I don't want to give them precise GPS data.

mhb 7y ago

That's swell. It would also be great if there was a single button on the Control Center that would allow me to toggle global location on/off instead of how it is which is multiple clicks, scroll and confirmation.

agra 7y ago

The major carriers sell real time location data, and have repeatedly lied about ending the practice. Sandboxing apps can't solve that problem, only democracy can. https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/qvqgnd/sprint-stop-selling-location-data-tmobile-att-microbilt-zumigo https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/qvqgnd/sprint-stop-sellin... https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/nepxbz/i-gave-a-bounty-hunter-300-dollars-located-phone-MicroBilt-zumigo-tmobile https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/nepxbz/i-gave-a-bounty-hu...

cglong 7y ago

This feature sounds great on paper, but what's always bugged me is that this only applies to third-party apps. Apple's own location tracking apps (Maps, Find My) aren't subjected to never-ending scary pop-up messages like their competitors.

classified 7y ago

> ...forcing advertisers to use inefficient data sources to pinpoint users. They should have said, "to pinpoint users against their will". If the user wanted to be pinpointed, they would allow location tracking in that app.

jonny383 7y ago

If you're running Android, I suggest you install one of the open source "firewall"s available on FDroid. Even if you don't plan on using it, make yourself aware of the sheer number of requests being sent _constantly_ from not only your applications, but by Android system services themselves. I'm not saying these requests are always related to ad tracking, but you can't argue there's a lot of information constantly being sent back an forth. Pro-tip: Your battery life will possibly double running a software firewall on Android...

n0rbwah 7y ago
Any app you've got in mind? The only one on https://search.f-droid.org/?q=firewall https://search.f-droid.org/?q=firewall doesn't seem to be of interest for that purpose.

wewake 7y ago

Apple already collects all the data of their users heavily and moves like these are simply meant to annoy their competitors (mostly Google) and keep the data to themselves while looking like a good kid in the valley. The number of gullible people aka Apple fanboys is staggering here who actually think Apple is trying to _save_ their privacy from advertisers after reading this highly biased article. Hah.

algesten 7y ago
Any sources for this?
- terminaljunkid 7y ago
  The blog is one of biggest apple fanboy bullshits out there. And given the bias against google in HN / reddit, it is quite simple why apple is heralded as preserver of privacy. Hell, one can disable most of google stuff and install f-droid, or even go lineageOS route. that's much, much more private than buying an overpriced, locked-in phone. If Google is evil because it tracks some (easily hide-able) data that only few zealots care, then apple is much more evil, because they patent trivial things (such as optional chaining in swift, or rounded corners of phones) and do misleading marketing.
cerberusss 7y ago
What makes you so sure about that?
- wewake 7y ago
  Consider [1] and [2] but you can find plenty more. [1] https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2019/01/apples-hypocritical-defense-data-privacy/581680/ https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2019/01/apple... [2] https://www.forbes.com/sites/kateoflahertyuk/2019/12/04/apple-iphone-11-iphone-11-pro-location-privacy-issue https://www.forbes.com/sites/kateoflahertyuk/2019/12/04/appl...
  - 7y ago

krisgenre 7y ago

To be fair I get a very similar notification when an app requests location data in the background in Android 10 too.

coreai 7y ago

On the other hand recently I restored my iPhone as new. The default settings may give users prompts to disable tracking but Siri is now a big tracker itself. Siri now learns from apps how you use them by default. While this may not be advertising and data may be on your device or with a trusted company like Apple, the idea of privacy should be that by default everything is opt in only. Who’s to say Apple is tailoring your iPhone behaviour ‘to your needs’ when in reality they are just trying to make you invest more into their ecosystem by learning from you ? That might sound like that’s helpful and might make the experience better but the main idea of tracking is still the same.

rpastuszak 7y ago

TL;DR: - 80% of iOS 13 users disabled background location tracking - vendors still report having collected more location-based data than a year before, but - the quality of data has decreased (vendors are ofsetting GPS data with geo ip lookups) I didn't find the UX and the initial permission/notification spam that annoying, as I've learned more about what's happening on my phone. Wondering if this is a shared sentiment or just my bias.

bilekas 7y ago

> The quality of that data is still a problem, as ad buyers notice it is of a lower quality than data that was previously available Not a problem at all.

sigwinch28 7y ago

Although it doesn't stop DNS over HTTPS, I use a DNS sinkhole on my home network and then I use wireguard to VPN into home when I'm not connected to my home WiFi. The Wireguard iOS app allows you to automatically connect to your configured interfaces based on whether you're using cellular data, connected to specific SSIDs, or disconnected from specific SSIDs. The only downside I have found to this approach so far is that it can break captive portals on public WiFi networks, which I will just disconnect from if I have a reasonable 4G signal.