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https://www.imore.com/apples-anti-tracking-iphone-feature-functionally-useless-claims-study https://www.imore.com/apples-anti-tracking-iphone-feature-fu...

by molsio 5y ago

zsmi 5y ago
Thanks for pointing me to that. It's hard not to agree with the Transparency Matters conclusion but the 13% drop in Tracking Attempts is worth calling out so I'm glad the Oxford researchers did it. This is not my field but one thing that I don't get when looking over the Transparency Matters report [1] is why do some apps have 9 trackers and others have 300 requests? Are they really so different? And are they able to get information that Starbucks didn't with only 3 trackers and 21 requests? I guess in the end the magnitudes aren't so important but I found the large differences pretty amazing. If nothing else I would think they might want to reduce the amount of data they need to retain, reducing their costs. It seems like there has to be diminishing returns there. It also shows how much data Google has as they show up on 8 of the 10 apps tracker lists and one can only assume they keep a copy of all that as well. So perhaps the iOS/Andriod comparison is meaningless anyway as Google knows all about you either way. [1] https://blog.lockdownprivacy.com/2021/09/22/study-effectiveness-of-apples-app-tracking-transparency.html https://blog.lockdownprivacy.com/2021/09/22/study-effectiven...
KoftaBob 5y ago
This article shows a fundamental misunderstanding of the functionality of "App Tracking Transparency", and I will admit the text "ask app not to track" is confusing. ATT, when a user selects "no", blocks the app from accessing your device ID. This makes it so that even though the app can still track what you do in their app, they can't connect that to the data collected from other apps through your device ID, and therefore build a profile of you as a person.

https://www.imore.com/apples-anti-tracking-iphone-feature-functionally-useless-claims-study https://www.imore.com/apples-anti-tracking-iphone-feature-fu...

by molsio 5y ago

https://www.imore.com/apples-anti-tracking-iphone-feature-functionally-useless-claims-study https://www.imore.com/apples-anti-tracking-iphone-feature-fu...

zsmi 5y ago

Thanks for pointing me to that. It's hard not to agree with the Transparency Matters conclusion but the 13% drop in Tracking Attempts is worth calling out so I'm glad the Oxford researchers did it. This is not my field but one thing that I don't get when looking over the Transparency Matters report [1] is why do some apps have 9 trackers and others have 300 requests? Are they really so different? And are they able to get information that Starbucks didn't with only 3 trackers and 21 requests? I guess in the end the magnitudes aren't so important but I found the large differences pretty amazing. If nothing else I would think they might want to reduce the amount of data they need to retain, reducing their costs. It seems like there has to be diminishing returns there. It also shows how much data Google has as they show up on 8 of the 10 apps tracker lists and one can only assume they keep a copy of all that as well. So perhaps the iOS/Andriod comparison is meaningless anyway as Google knows all about you either way. [1] https://blog.lockdownprivacy.com/2021/09/22/study-effectiveness-of-apples-app-tracking-transparency.html https://blog.lockdownprivacy.com/2021/09/22/study-effectiven...

KoftaBob 5y ago

This article shows a fundamental misunderstanding of the functionality of "App Tracking Transparency", and I will admit the text "ask app not to track" is confusing. ATT, when a user selects "no", blocks the app from accessing your device ID. This makes it so that even though the app can still track what you do in their app, they can't connect that to the data collected from other apps through your device ID, and therefore build a profile of you as a person.