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> If Apple doesn't access the IDFA, but provide the mechanism to do so for others, then clearly Apple is still violating the law. I'd disagree with that. It's

> If Apple doesn't access the IDFA, but provide the mechanism to do so for others, then clearly Apple is still violating the law. I'd disagree with that. It's like blaming the browser for storing the cookie which Facebook uses to track users across websites. If Apple would use the IDFA in their own products, then it would be a different story.

Nextgrid 6y ago
The difference is that browser cookies are necessary for sessions and persisting state - Facebook exploiting this for nefarious purposes isn't the browser's fault. IDFA's only purpose is tracking. I can't see any legitimate use for it. In this case Apple intentionally created a feature (which most people aren't even aware of) that only has malicious use-cases.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- pmontra 6y ago
  They are convenient. Before cookies we used a session id in the URL and storage on the server.
- user-the-name 6y ago
  The IDFA is intentionally limited to prevent many malicious use cases. For instance, each vendor will see a different IDFA for the same device, so you can not collect IDFAs to track users across applications. It is for tracking, but not all tracking is malicious. It is used for things like attributing an ad impression to an app install, to measure how effective an ad campaign is at getting people to install an app. This information doesn't really tell you anything about individual users, but is still useful when aggregated.
  - realusername 6y ago
    Why not just scrap the IDFA and let the app save themselves a random uuid in their sqlite database then? Am I missing something?
    - zepto 6y ago
      The point of IDFA is to allow the user to express a system wide preference, and also to allow the identifier to persist across installs. Although the overwhelming majority of people distrust tracking, a significant minority >20% do not. Every time the discussion comes up here we see people who say they like targeted advertising. Apple wants to exclude other mechanisms and have an opt-in mechanism to support this 20%. They are one step away from making it opt-in but were delayed by political pressure from Facebook. If Ad Tracking companies improve their practices, perhaps they can persuade more people to opt-in. Apple has reached this point by slowly eliminating other sources of fingerprinting from their apis, and adding rules insisting that IDFA be the only identifier used. The only issue here is that IDFA is not yet opt-in. Otherwise, Apple is way ahead of the game. All other platforms allow some kind of fingerprinting.
    - user-the-name 6y ago
      It is shared across web and apps but only for one vendor. So you can track the performance of an ad campaign on getting installs of your app, for instance.
      - Nextgrid 6y ago
        > So you can track the performance of an ad campaign on getting installs of your app, for instance. So in order for it to work you'd need to also be the developer (vendor) of the initial app which displays the advertisement for your second ad? Otherwise how would it work if let's say your ad is displayed in app from vendor A (and they get their own IDFA), now when your (vendor B) app is installed you see a different IDFA. How would you associate the two?
  - Nextgrid 6y ago
    Are you confusing it with the IDFV (identifier for vendor)? As far as I know the IDFA is explicitly shared across apps for ad targeting to work (including most of the examples you mention). > This information doesn't really tell you anything about individual users Except when you correlate it with other information that does identify individual users and suddenly you've deanonymized this "anonymous" ID. Scum like Facebook, Google, data brokers and advertising companies base their entire business on this and that needs to stop.
mola 6y ago
That's just not the same. A website is asking the browser to put a cookie. So the browser is just a channel. If I understand correctly The IFDA is an identifier created by apple, which they let third parties access. The phone is not a channel, it is the creator of the ID so you're analogy doesn't hold. And come on, the name of this is proof enough that the only use for this ID is tracking users. Cookies are used to store anything, not necessarily specific for tracking.

Nextgrid 6y ago

The difference is that browser cookies are necessary for sessions and persisting state - Facebook exploiting this for nefarious purposes isn't the browser's fault. IDFA's only purpose is tracking. I can't see any legitimate use for it. In this case Apple intentionally created a feature (which most people aren't even aware of) that only has malicious use-cases.

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
pmontra 6y ago
They are convenient. Before cookies we used a session id in the URL and storage on the server.
user-the-name 6y ago
The IDFA is intentionally limited to prevent many malicious use cases. For instance, each vendor will see a different IDFA for the same device, so you can not collect IDFAs to track users across applications. It is for tracking, but not all tracking is malicious. It is used for things like attributing an ad impression to an app install, to measure how effective an ad campaign is at getting people to install an app. This information doesn't really tell you anything about individual users, but is still useful when aggregated.
- realusername 6y ago
  Why not just scrap the IDFA and let the app save themselves a random uuid in their sqlite database then? Am I missing something?
  - zepto 6y ago
    The point of IDFA is to allow the user to express a system wide preference, and also to allow the identifier to persist across installs. Although the overwhelming majority of people distrust tracking, a significant minority >20% do not. Every time the discussion comes up here we see people who say they like targeted advertising. Apple wants to exclude other mechanisms and have an opt-in mechanism to support this 20%. They are one step away from making it opt-in but were delayed by political pressure from Facebook. If Ad Tracking companies improve their practices, perhaps they can persuade more people to opt-in. Apple has reached this point by slowly eliminating other sources of fingerprinting from their apis, and adding rules insisting that IDFA be the only identifier used. The only issue here is that IDFA is not yet opt-in. Otherwise, Apple is way ahead of the game. All other platforms allow some kind of fingerprinting.
  - user-the-name 6y ago
    It is shared across web and apps but only for one vendor. So you can track the performance of an ad campaign on getting installs of your app, for instance.
    - Nextgrid 6y ago
      > So you can track the performance of an ad campaign on getting installs of your app, for instance. So in order for it to work you'd need to also be the developer (vendor) of the initial app which displays the advertisement for your second ad? Otherwise how would it work if let's say your ad is displayed in app from vendor A (and they get their own IDFA), now when your (vendor B) app is installed you see a different IDFA. How would you associate the two?
- Nextgrid 6y ago
  Are you confusing it with the IDFV (identifier for vendor)? As far as I know the IDFA is explicitly shared across apps for ad targeting to work (including most of the examples you mention). > This information doesn't really tell you anything about individual users Except when you correlate it with other information that does identify individual users and suddenly you've deanonymized this "anonymous" ID. Scum like Facebook, Google, data brokers and advertising companies base their entire business on this and that needs to stop.

mola 6y ago

That's just not the same. A website is asking the browser to put a cookie. So the browser is just a channel. If I understand correctly The IFDA is an identifier created by apple, which they let third parties access. The phone is not a channel, it is the creator of the ID so you're analogy doesn't hold. And come on, the name of this is proof enough that the only use for this ID is tracking users. Cookies are used to store anything, not necessarily specific for tracking.