5 ms·

I'm actually okay with the Apple Camera app asking me once and the Domino's Pizza app having to ask me twice. Who are the consumers being harmed here?

arrosenberg 2y ago
It's anti-competitive. Apple owns the platform and is giving preference to it's own apps on that platform. Every non-Apple app that competes with an Apple app is harmed.
- tedunangst 2y ago
  So the solution is Apple will be forced to trust that apps asked properly, and grant whatever permissions the app claims I agreed to? And that's going to encourage me to use more third party apps?
  - arrosenberg 2y ago
    If they want to own the platform and compete on it simultaneously, they need to abide by the same common carrier rules they impose on everyone else. They could easily achieve this by enforcing the same level of security on their own apps.
  - arcticbull 2y ago
    They could just ask twice on their own apps.
- BeFlatXIII 2y ago
  I thought the double pop-ups were because the app asks permission to ask permission, rather than Apple requiring apps to prompt twice.
- st3fan 2y ago
  This is not what this case is about.
  - arrosenberg 2y ago
    Seems like it’s roughly what it is about. Apple has a mandatory consent, but won’t adapt it so that third party apps can integrate their own tracking consent into it. As a result third party apps are treated differently than first party because they have one fewer consent screen. That advantages entrenched incumbents with big, locked-in user bases and disadvantages new entrants. Since Apple owns the platform, it’s anticompetitive to pass regulations (which is what Apple is doing here) that discriminate against other participants in a way that acts as a competitive advantage.
    - dkga 2y ago
      Yes, but are consumers that knowingly bought into the Apple ecosystem harmed?
      - JadeNB 2y ago
        > Yes, but are consumers that knowingly bought into the Apple ecosystem harmed? It seems that this logic would prevent any regulation of what happens on macOS or iOS, since anyone who is using either has knowingly bought into the Apple ecosystem. (And analogously for Windows, since anyone who is using it has knowingly bought into the Microsoft ecosystem.)
      - overfeed 2y ago
        Consumers are only part of the competition equation. I bet consumers also love the initial phases of dumping, but regulators have to look beyond short-term consumer preferences.
        abduhl 2y ago
        Regulators don’t have to look beyond short term consumer preference (or rather, consumer benefit) with respect to dumping actually, because only the long term aspect of dumping (when prices are raised on consumers after driving competitors out of the market) is illegal. A company is free to burn as much capital as it wants while it is trying to enter and take over a market.
pests 2y ago
Domino's?
- jtmarl1n 2y ago
  US-based Pizza restaurant
  - pests 2y ago
    I know what it is. They were asking who was harmed.
    - Retric 2y ago
      Double conformation would presumably help Dominoes as it would encourage people to accept tracking.
      - deleted 2y ago
        [deleted]
      - Retric 2y ago
        To clarify across 10’s of millions of people even slight inconvenience really does push people to accept 3rd party tracking. There’s a lot of dark patterns websites use because AB testing shows even slightly more effort works.
surgical_fire 2y ago
It doesn't really matter if you are "fine" with their anti-conpetitive behavior. They should comply to regulations properly.
- tedunangst 2y ago
  Why do we have regulations? Who do they benefit?
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
  - simion314 2y ago
    >Why do we have regulations? Who do they benefit? Weird you still have no idea why. So let me tell you, there was a tribe in a village and they had many rules, some young boys hated the rules so they left and made their own village with no rules. One day one of them made a fire and let it unsupervised and many of their shacks burned so the boys decided that there should be one rule about not letting fires unsupervised.... the story continues with similar issues happening and they reluctantly adding one more tule, then one more rule until they get tot he same original rules from the original village.
    - BeFlatXIII 2y ago
      That's some nice story, not relevant facts.
      - simion314 2y ago
        >That's some nice story, not relevant facts. My response is on topic for the comment it responds. But in case someone else fails to understand the message, the rules are added because someone made something bad intentionally or now, so can you guess why the companies were forced to add "Unsubscribe" in their emails? do you think someone imagined this rule for no reason ?
    - maccard 2y ago
burnte 2y ago
You might be ok with it, but the regulators want Apple to treat third parties the same way they treat their own apps, and that's a good thing. Either everyone would generate two prompts, or no one, but excluding yourself is just favoritism.
- LorenPechtel 2y ago
  Yup, it's much, much better for the rules to be exactly the same than any debate about how much difference is permitted. No difference unless you can demonstrate a compelling reason for it.
- briandear 2y ago
  Apple doesn’t have a track record of abusing user privacy, unlike the plethora of third party apps that want to aggressively track you and sell that data.
  - epolanski 2y ago
    Apple makes more than 10B $ on advertising unless you've been leaving under a rock, and it's virtually all targeted ads. In fact them limiting more and more third party access to data is just a play to boost their own selling of your data.
    - shuckles 2y ago
      There is a big difference between targeting and tracking.
      - itishappy 2y ago
        Tracking is just targeting integrated over time. If you can be targeted a number of times, and somebody can connect those data points, that's tracking! So I guess the question hinges on if the data Apple shares with their partners can be fingerprinted or not.
        2y ago
llm_nerd 2y ago
The Camera app wouldn't need an ATT confirmation, of course. Apple has some other products which do feature targeted advertisements, including News and even the App Store itself. Apple created this problem for itself when they decided that they wanted to double dip and become advertisers (while conveniently making advertisement less effective for everyone else). The amount they net from it surely can't be worth the trouble is causes. It's also simply scummy and always puts conflicting interests at play. Still don't understand the two versus one confirmation thing. I have tracking entirely disabled so apps can't even request it, but it'd be nice to see some workflow of how Apple's tracking works versus everyone else. The complaint almost seems that Apple apps simply do track your details and use them for targeting, without any confirmation (which Apple argues is okay because there is no third party getting the deets), where others have to do the confirmation.
golli 2y ago
And if it weren't a dominos app, but an otherwise identical or better third party app? Which through this now has a disadvantage compared to Apples app. Making it worse (regardless of how small or large that downside is) compared to whatever Apple offers, not because of having the worse product in the category, but because Apple also happens to own the otherwise unrelated operating system.
- frumper 2y ago
  Domino's doesn't have to ask twice. They're choosing to.
  - joshuaissac 2y ago
    > Domino's doesn't have to ask twice. They're choosing to. According to the article, the French agency believes they would have to ask twice: > Third-party publishers "cannot rely on the ATT framework to comply with their legal obligations," so they "must continue to use their own consent collection solution," the French agency said.
    - fnordsensei 2y ago
      I always thought it was because where you to deny in the Apple popup, that decision is “final”, whereas if they can gauge your mood before that, they can keep pestering you about it in the future. I’ve seen confirm (app) -> confirm (Apple), but never deny (app) -> deny (Apple).
st3fan 2y ago
I don't think the Camera app asks for permission to use the Camera. You could argue that choice is questionable because Apple needs to follow its own rules, but also .. it is the Camera app. I think if you don't want the Camera app to use the Camera you probably should not have opened the app at all. ATT (App Tracking Transparency) is the dialog that says something like "Facebook would like permission to track you across apps and websites owned by other companies. Your data will be used to ... $AppProvidedExcuseHere." with "Allow Tracking" and "Ask App Not To Track" buttons. ATT is the First consent. The SECOND consent this case is about is the in-app consent that needs to happen according to French law. I can't give an example of that because I do not live in France but I assume this is probably some horribly designed page inside a French app that asks you to share your data with the ad surveilance industry.
- maccard 2y ago
  > The SECOND consent this case is about is the in-app consent that needs to happen according to French law. I can't give an example of that because I do not live in France but I assume this is probably some horribly designed page inside a French app that asks you to share your data with the ad surveilance industry. I don't live in france but I'm familiar with the popups. many apps on first install will give you an in-app prompt asking if they can send you push notifications. If you accept, you get the system prompt. if you decline, you don't. I'm not a regulator, but it seems they've misread this one IMO - they only need to provide the conseent at the platform level and can opt out at the platform level if they so wish.
johnnyanmac 2y ago
it's not the consumers, it's the competitors. Instead of comparing apples to pizas, compare something like the Notes app compared to a 3rd party notes app. Any web/app dev knows each extra click adds friction and reduces retention, so that extra pop up can be a subtle advantadge to the one who manages the platform.
aiauthoritydev 2y ago
The pen pushers in France. As a consumer your choice does not matter much as much as the government servants who have decided that they know what is good for you.
wdr1 2y ago
Are you also okay with Apple only asking once for Apple Advertising and making other advertising ask twice? I don't mean ads for Apple products. I mean the ads that Apple sells in News, the App Store, where they track your behavior to personalize the ads you see and to see if you ever buy what the ad is selling.
sitkack 2y ago
You should decide for everyone whether Apple gets a pass.
octacat 2y ago
Apple has its own trackers and ad services. But it treats itself specially. While other apps need to ask. Maybe I don't want some apps from apple to have the same permissions, as other apps from apple. It is basically bundling. I agreed for one app from apple to share data, not for all apps from apple. Oh, and don't let me start about wording they use on these pop-ups... Like when I download some app from the internet, which is signed, notarized and so on, it still asks: oh, you downloaded this app from the internet (surprise!)... Instead of: "ok, you downloaded from internet, it has sign, notarification, developer is already delivering software for 10 years and have 20 million users, so looks safe to run...". Basically, fear inducing messages instead of actually useful from security sense.

arrosenberg 2y ago

It's anti-competitive. Apple owns the platform and is giving preference to it's own apps on that platform. Every non-Apple app that competes with an Apple app is harmed.

tedunangst 2y ago
So the solution is Apple will be forced to trust that apps asked properly, and grant whatever permissions the app claims I agreed to? And that's going to encourage me to use more third party apps?
- arrosenberg 2y ago
  If they want to own the platform and compete on it simultaneously, they need to abide by the same common carrier rules they impose on everyone else. They could easily achieve this by enforcing the same level of security on their own apps.
- arcticbull 2y ago
  They could just ask twice on their own apps.
BeFlatXIII 2y ago
I thought the double pop-ups were because the app asks permission to ask permission, rather than Apple requiring apps to prompt twice.
st3fan 2y ago
This is not what this case is about.
- arrosenberg 2y ago
  Seems like it’s roughly what it is about. Apple has a mandatory consent, but won’t adapt it so that third party apps can integrate their own tracking consent into it. As a result third party apps are treated differently than first party because they have one fewer consent screen. That advantages entrenched incumbents with big, locked-in user bases and disadvantages new entrants. Since Apple owns the platform, it’s anticompetitive to pass regulations (which is what Apple is doing here) that discriminate against other participants in a way that acts as a competitive advantage.
  - dkga 2y ago
    Yes, but are consumers that knowingly bought into the Apple ecosystem harmed?
    - JadeNB 2y ago
      > Yes, but are consumers that knowingly bought into the Apple ecosystem harmed? It seems that this logic would prevent any regulation of what happens on macOS or iOS, since anyone who is using either has knowingly bought into the Apple ecosystem. (And analogously for Windows, since anyone who is using it has knowingly bought into the Microsoft ecosystem.)
    - overfeed 2y ago
      Consumers are only part of the competition equation. I bet consumers also love the initial phases of dumping, but regulators have to look beyond short-term consumer preferences.
      - abduhl 2y ago
        Regulators don’t have to look beyond short term consumer preference (or rather, consumer benefit) with respect to dumping actually, because only the long term aspect of dumping (when prices are raised on consumers after driving competitors out of the market) is illegal. A company is free to burn as much capital as it wants while it is trying to enter and take over a market.

pests 2y ago

Domino's?

jtmarl1n 2y ago
US-based Pizza restaurant
- pests 2y ago
  I know what it is. They were asking who was harmed.
  - Retric 2y ago
    Double conformation would presumably help Dominoes as it would encourage people to accept tracking.
    - deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
    - Retric 2y ago
      To clarify across 10’s of millions of people even slight inconvenience really does push people to accept 3rd party tracking. There’s a lot of dark patterns websites use because AB testing shows even slightly more effort works.

surgical_fire 2y ago

It doesn't really matter if you are "fine" with their anti-conpetitive behavior. They should comply to regulations properly.

tedunangst 2y ago
Why do we have regulations? Who do they benefit?
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- simion314 2y ago
  >Why do we have regulations? Who do they benefit? Weird you still have no idea why. So let me tell you, there was a tribe in a village and they had many rules, some young boys hated the rules so they left and made their own village with no rules. One day one of them made a fire and let it unsupervised and many of their shacks burned so the boys decided that there should be one rule about not letting fires unsupervised.... the story continues with similar issues happening and they reluctantly adding one more tule, then one more rule until they get tot he same original rules from the original village.
  - BeFlatXIII 2y ago
    That's some nice story, not relevant facts.
    - simion314 2y ago
      >That's some nice story, not relevant facts. My response is on topic for the comment it responds. But in case someone else fails to understand the message, the rules are added because someone made something bad intentionally or now, so can you guess why the companies were forced to add "Unsubscribe" in their emails? do you think someone imagined this rule for no reason ?
  - maccard 2y ago

burnte 2y ago

You might be ok with it, but the regulators want Apple to treat third parties the same way they treat their own apps, and that's a good thing. Either everyone would generate two prompts, or no one, but excluding yourself is just favoritism.

LorenPechtel 2y ago
Yup, it's much, much better for the rules to be exactly the same than any debate about how much difference is permitted. No difference unless you can demonstrate a compelling reason for it.
briandear 2y ago
Apple doesn’t have a track record of abusing user privacy, unlike the plethora of third party apps that want to aggressively track you and sell that data.
- epolanski 2y ago
  Apple makes more than 10B $ on advertising unless you've been leaving under a rock, and it's virtually all targeted ads. In fact them limiting more and more third party access to data is just a play to boost their own selling of your data.
  - shuckles 2y ago
    There is a big difference between targeting and tracking.
    - itishappy 2y ago
      Tracking is just targeting integrated over time. If you can be targeted a number of times, and somebody can connect those data points, that's tracking! So I guess the question hinges on if the data Apple shares with their partners can be fingerprinted or not.
      - 2y ago

llm_nerd 2y ago

The Camera app wouldn't need an ATT confirmation, of course. Apple has some other products which do feature targeted advertisements, including News and even the App Store itself. Apple created this problem for itself when they decided that they wanted to double dip and become advertisers (while conveniently making advertisement less effective for everyone else). The amount they net from it surely can't be worth the trouble is causes. It's also simply scummy and always puts conflicting interests at play. Still don't understand the two versus one confirmation thing. I have tracking entirely disabled so apps can't even request it, but it'd be nice to see some workflow of how Apple's tracking works versus everyone else. The complaint almost seems that Apple apps simply do track your details and use them for targeting, without any confirmation (which Apple argues is okay because there is no third party getting the deets), where others have to do the confirmation.

golli 2y ago

And if it weren't a dominos app, but an otherwise identical or better third party app? Which through this now has a disadvantage compared to Apples app. Making it worse (regardless of how small or large that downside is) compared to whatever Apple offers, not because of having the worse product in the category, but because Apple also happens to own the otherwise unrelated operating system.

frumper 2y ago
Domino's doesn't have to ask twice. They're choosing to.
- joshuaissac 2y ago
  > Domino's doesn't have to ask twice. They're choosing to. According to the article, the French agency believes they would have to ask twice: > Third-party publishers "cannot rely on the ATT framework to comply with their legal obligations," so they "must continue to use their own consent collection solution," the French agency said.
  - fnordsensei 2y ago
    I always thought it was because where you to deny in the Apple popup, that decision is “final”, whereas if they can gauge your mood before that, they can keep pestering you about it in the future. I’ve seen confirm (app) -> confirm (Apple), but never deny (app) -> deny (Apple).

st3fan 2y ago

I don't think the Camera app asks for permission to use the Camera. You could argue that choice is questionable because Apple needs to follow its own rules, but also .. it is the Camera app. I think if you don't want the Camera app to use the Camera you probably should not have opened the app at all. ATT (App Tracking Transparency) is the dialog that says something like "Facebook would like permission to track you across apps and websites owned by other companies. Your data will be used to ... $AppProvidedExcuseHere." with "Allow Tracking" and "Ask App Not To Track" buttons. ATT is the First consent. The SECOND consent this case is about is the in-app consent that needs to happen according to French law. I can't give an example of that because I do not live in France but I assume this is probably some horribly designed page inside a French app that asks you to share your data with the ad surveilance industry.

maccard 2y ago
> The SECOND consent this case is about is the in-app consent that needs to happen according to French law. I can't give an example of that because I do not live in France but I assume this is probably some horribly designed page inside a French app that asks you to share your data with the ad surveilance industry. I don't live in france but I'm familiar with the popups. many apps on first install will give you an in-app prompt asking if they can send you push notifications. If you accept, you get the system prompt. if you decline, you don't. I'm not a regulator, but it seems they've misread this one IMO - they only need to provide the conseent at the platform level and can opt out at the platform level if they so wish.

johnnyanmac 2y ago

it's not the consumers, it's the competitors. Instead of comparing apples to pizas, compare something like the Notes app compared to a 3rd party notes app. Any web/app dev knows each extra click adds friction and reduces retention, so that extra pop up can be a subtle advantadge to the one who manages the platform.

aiauthoritydev 2y ago

The pen pushers in France. As a consumer your choice does not matter much as much as the government servants who have decided that they know what is good for you.

wdr1 2y ago

Are you also okay with Apple only asking once for Apple Advertising and making other advertising ask twice? I don't mean ads for Apple products. I mean the ads that Apple sells in News, the App Store, where they track your behavior to personalize the ads you see and to see if you ever buy what the ad is selling.

sitkack 2y ago

You should decide for everyone whether Apple gets a pass.

octacat 2y ago

Apple has its own trackers and ad services. But it treats itself specially. While other apps need to ask. Maybe I don't want some apps from apple to have the same permissions, as other apps from apple. It is basically bundling. I agreed for one app from apple to share data, not for all apps from apple. Oh, and don't let me start about wording they use on these pop-ups... Like when I download some app from the internet, which is signed, notarized and so on, it still asks: oh, you downloaded this app from the internet (surprise!)... Instead of: "ok, you downloaded from internet, it has sign, notarification, developer is already delivering software for 10 years and have 20 million users, so looks safe to run...". Basically, fear inducing messages instead of actually useful from security sense.