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iOS 9 Policy Change Prevents Advertisers From Seeing Installed Apps on User Devices

Why does Apple even need to see it? I'm mean they talk a good game about privacy, but yet I have no way to log on to my Apple account and see what information they have on me? Where's the transparency? In fact, why can't I delete my Apple ID at will if so choose? If I want to make a clean account with Apple, I just have to accept the fact my old account will forever exist?

You see, with Google, I can log on to my account right now and delete it in full. I can go to my Google Dashboard and see what info they are storing and how it's used. Google is fully transparent. They make it know what they are doing as you guys frequently like to point out ("you're the product!").

So what are you hiding Apple? Why can't I ever delete my Apple ID???
 
Well Google is not that bad, when a friend ask you with how many girls you had slept with..you just ask Google Now
 
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derekmlr said:
Privacy is great, lots of **** ads, but I dunno. Doesn't seem like that much of a privacy concern. I mean, hell, it'll at least help target you with stuff you don't already have, instead of being spammed with ads of stuff you've already got.
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Am I in the minority that I've never been interested in internet ads? I've never seen any that were even close to relevant. I've recently started seeing a bunch for websites I've visited, but generally it's sites I've visited doing customer research and not researching products I'm actually interested in. And wow, when those ads pop up, they are nonstop.
 
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PJWilkin said:
Given the amount of trolls that frequent the forums, and the lack of either a :) or /s, its hard to tell
The comment was inline with someone posting on Engadget :)
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Fair enough. I thought it was enough to be written off as just silly. Have you seen the comment section on BGR lately? Not a single article without troll wars. And I'm talking about YouTube comment level trolling. It's enough to make me not want to ever visit the site.
 
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Razeus said:
Why does Apple even need to see it? I'm mean they talk a good game about privacy, but yet I have no way to log on to my Apple account and see what information they have on me? Where's the transparency? In fact, why can't I delete my Apple ID at will if so choose? If I want to make a clean account with Apple, I just have to accept the fact my old account will forever exist?

You see, with Google, I can log on to my account right now and delete it in full. I can go to my Google Dashboard and see what info they are storing and how it's used. Google is fully transparent. They make it know what they are doing as you guys frequently like to point out ("you're the product!").

So what are you hiding Apple? Why can't I ever delete my Apple ID???
Click to expand...
Why does Apple need to have a list of installed apps? I suppose you'd like to pay full price each time you delete and reinstall a paid app.

As for the rest of your post... I'm not sure why it was necessary to bend over backwards to bash Apple and defend Google when Google wasn't even mentioned in the article. But since you've brought it up... if the worst thing you have against Apple is that they won't let you delete your account, I'd say that bodes pretty well for them.
 
Saucesome2000 said:
Fair enough. I thought it was enough to be written off as just silly. Have you seen the comment section on BGR lately? Not a single article without troll wars. And I'm talking about YouTube comment level trolling. It's enough to make me not want to ever visit the site.
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Yes, seen BGR, but Engadget seems to take the prize for Apple hate. All you need to say on there is you ate an apple for lunch and the whole thing descends into dozens of people slating Apple for something
I gave up reading the Engadget comments sections over a year ago because of serious lack of intelligence there
 
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unplugme71 said:
I deleted twitter and facebook app. Problem solved.
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You should just throw your phone in the ocean after burning it to crisp and wrap it in tinfoil.
You know, just to be sure.
Also, it isn't even linked to their iOS apps, but to iAds.

GFLPraxis said:
Well, because they have to push update notifications to your device...
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Many reasons.
Sending you push notifications, being able to restore a paid app on your phone if you deleted it and want to download it again, to use their kill switch if ever an app is compromised.
 
Epiphron said:
Wait so are they removing the canOpenURL API? Any devs know what's actually going on?
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I second this question. Is Apple somehow only allowing legitimate use cases of canOpenURL? How are they going to enforce it? Or are they changing how apps are able to open one another?
 
I'm a recent Mac convert, having run Linux on the desktop for about 20 years. I've been skeptical that paying the Apple premium was really worth the better user experience. With the recent focus on both privacy and security, I'm all too happy to be a OS X/iOS user for life. Any time a governmental agency (like law enforcement) complains about what a company is doing, that's a sign they're doing something in the CUSTOMER'S interest. As they say, if you aren't paying, you aren't the customer. I'm saying I'm glad to pay the PREMIUM to be the customer Apple cares about. (You may pay for Microsoft products, but corporations are still their REAL customers.)
 
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I seriously hate corporations that invade MY privacy without my explicit consent.

If an individual does this it's typically considered illegal. A corporation does it and it's just 'business'.
 
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Saucesome2000 said:
Fair enough. I thought it was enough to be written off as just silly. Have you seen the comment section on BGR lately? Not a single article without troll wars. And I'm talking about YouTube comment level trolling. It's enough to make me not want to ever visit the site.
Click to expand...
TheRealDunkirk said:
I'm a recent Mac convert, having run Linux on the desktop for about 20 years. I've been skeptical that paying the Apple premium was really worth the better user experience. With the recent focus on both privacy and security, I'm all too happy to be a OS X/iOS user for life. Any time a governmental agency (like law enforcement) complains about what a company is doing, that's a sign they're doing something in the CUSTOMER'S interest. As they say, if you aren't paying, you aren't the customer. I'm saying I'm glad to pay the PREMIUM to be the customer Apple cares about. (You may pay for Microsoft products, but corporations are still their REAL customers.)
Click to expand...

Enjoy your honeymoon period, in a few years you'll just be bitter about Apple as the rest of us :D
 
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With hindsight I guess it was obvious that this was possible - how many times have you visited a website and seen a message saying that there was an App available to use instead of that website, but only if you don't have the app installed? I guess the only way that could work would be this same method that's being exploited by advertisers.

So does that mean we won't be seeing these app prompts in the future? On occasion, I've found them useful as it's easier than having to search the App Store "just in case" there's an app for online services I use
 
Epiphron said:
Wait so are they removing the canOpenURL API? Any devs know what's actually going on?
Click to expand...

I don't think they remove it outright, but they hope to replace the functionality with something else. If I understood this correctly, and I may be wrong, iOS 9 will support universal links. Currently, an app like Facebook may occupy the custom URL scheme "facebook://" so that other apps can deep link into the Facebook app. These other apps can use canOpenURL() to verify whether there is an app that can handle a specific custom URL scheme and then use openURL() to open the URL (or use a web link as an alternative). Facebook and Twitter seem to abuse the canOpenURL() method by checking lots of custom URL schemes to ascertain which apps the user has installed. That is of course not the reason why this method was created.

iOS 9 will offer an alternative to custom URL schemes in the form of universal links that look more like web URLs. When, for instance, Facebook implements this, then the system decides how to open a link that leads to Facebook.com: either in the app or in the browser. Other apps don't have to use canOpenURL() anymore as the URL will be opened regardless. I think the idea is that developers will at some point deprecate or remove their custom URL schemes, making canOpenURL() less useful.
 
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ArtOfWarfare said:
I second this question. Is Apple somehow only allowing legitimate use cases of canOpenURL? How are they going to enforce it? Or are they changing how apps are able to open one another?
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I don't see any other way to enforce this except by doing so on a case-by-case basis. I mean, I don't know anything about their review process... maybe they have some sort of automated process that picks up on unauthorized use of otherwise "legal" code? Either way, they're going to have to do this carefully in order to not step on the toes of developers.

EDIT: Right after I posted this, I saw KALLT's much better explanation above.
 
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