Apple's advertising system for monetizing its apps and services is now the target of a new complaint in France brought by a lobby group representing startups and venture capital firms.
The complaint, filed Tuesday by France Digitale with the French National Data Protection Commission (CNIL), focuses on an Apple feature that displays personalized advertising in the App Store, Apple News, and the Stocks app based on a user's data, Bloomberg reports. The group explains that it had to act because Apple's system does not ask for user permission to receive personalized advertising, which is enabled by default. Users are "insufficiently informed about the use and processing of their personal data," the association wrote in the complaint, a copy of which was obtained by Bloomberg. is called it in it:
Apple's system differs from classic tracking
Apple reserves the right to arbitrarily decide who is a partner and who is a third party, a point that may change over time without the user being informed of such a change.
The complaint comes ahead of Apple's planned rollout of a new App Tracking Transparency feature that will limit how much data third-party advertising systems can collect about users. As a reminder, after the release of iOS 14.5, all apps that access an iPhone's advertising identifier, or "IDFA," will be required to obtain user permission before allowing tracking. The upcoming feature has drawn criticism from Facebook and other advertisers, who fear that many users are unhappy with being tracked across apps for ad personalization purposes. However, classic app tracking differs from Apple's own Ad Personalization system, which does not track users across apps or identify users to target its ads. Instead, it relies on anonymous grouping of common user characteristics, such as apps downloaded, age, country or location, and gender.
Cupertino takes a stand: “A pathetic attempt to distract”
However, that hasn't stopped France Digitale from claiming that this still gives Apple an advantage over third parties when it comes to iPhone app-based advertising. Apple responded to the complaint in a statement provided to Bloomberg, which reads:
The allegations in the complaint are patently false and will be seen for what they are, a pathetic attempt by those who track users to distract from their own actions and mislead regulators and policymakers. Transparency and control for the user are core pillars of our privacy philosophy, which is why we apply app tracking transparency equally to all developers, including Apple. Privacy is built into the ads we sell on our platform, with no tracking.
French Digitale's lawsuit follows another complaint against Apple filed by advertising firms and publishers with the French competition authority in October 2020. That complaint argued that the enhanced privacy measures introduced by Apple's Tracking Transparency were anti-competitive. A decision from the French regulator is expected soon. Depending on the outcome, Apple could be forced to omit the enhanced privacy feature in iOS 14.5 for users in France. (Photo by ADCstock / Bigstockphoto)
