I don’t understand how so many people are still being played by Apple with this and similar things. The only reason App Tracking Transparency (ATT) exists is the following:
- Apple wasn’t making direct revenue from free apps where developers and advertisers earned money through ads.
- Apple wasn’t making revenue from advertising on social media platforms or search engines.
At some point, Apple decided they also wanted a cut of that market. Apparently, the income from device sales and the 30% commission on app purchases and subscriptions wasn’t enough. So, they created their own Apple Ads system to capture part of the ad market.
However, when that didn’t generate as much revenue as expected, they came up with ATT. Apple sold it to consumers as a privacy feature, but in reality, it made non-Apple advertising more difficult and expensive for developers — effectively pushing them to use Apple Ads.
I’m in favor of letting users decide and keeping ATT — that’s fine in principle. But if Apple truly cares about user privacy, then it should apply the same rules to itself. In other words, Apple shouldn’t be allowed to sell ads either.
As soon as you search for something on the App Store and Apple shows you an ad based on your keywords, they’re already using your behavior to target you. That means they’re taking advantage of the very same data collection and targeting practices they’ve restricted for everyone else.
So, if Apple genuinely wanted to protect user privacy, it would ban
all personalized ads — including its own — instead of using privacy as a way to limit competitors while keeping the profits for itself.