Apple is following through on its pledge to crack down Facebook and other snoopy apps that secretly shadow people on their iPhones to help sell more advertising.
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The new privacy feature, dubbed "App Tracking Transparency," rolled out Monday as part of an update to the operating system powering the iPhone and iPad. The anti-tracking shield included in iOS 14.5 arrives after a seven-month delay during which Apple and Facebook attacked each other's business models and motives for decisions that affect billions of people around the world.
Apple says it is just looking out for the best interests of the more than 1 billion people currently using iPhones.
Once the software update is installed – something most iPhone users do—even existing apps already on the device will be required to ask and receive consent to track online activities. That's a shift Facebook fiercely resisted, most prominently in a series of full-page newspaper ads blasting Apple.
