During the unveiling of the new operating system for our iPhones, iOS 17, Apple mentioned that it significantly enhances the privacy of Safari with a new anti-tracking system. They stated that this feature only works in private browsing mode, as explained in the keynote. However, the truth is that it goes beyond that.
How to improve, and a lot, our privacy with a simple adjustment
Link Tracking Protection tackles one of the most intrusive practices that advertising services and analytics companies have found to track our online activity, even when conventional protection methods are used. By placing tracking parameters on links, user activity can be tracked across different web pages, bypassing features like Safari’s Intelligent Tracking Prevention, which blocks cookies and other session storage methods.
Tapping on a URL with tracking parameters allows advertising or analytics services to read the URL, extract the parameters, and associate them with the user’s profile in their database. This way, they can serve personalized ads based on the user’s online activity and continue collecting data on our browsing patterns.
Now, with iOS 17, macOS Sonoma, and other operating systems, this practice comes to an end. The system can detect tracking parameters in URLs and automatically remove them. By default, the protection is always active in Mail and Messages and kicks in when we browse using Safari’s private mode. Do we want better protection? Here’s how we can get it:
- Open the Settings app on our iPhone or iPad.
- Go to Safari.
- Tap on Advanced.
- Enter Advanced Tracking Protection.
- Select All Browsing.
By doing so, regardless of whether we use private or regular browsing mode, websites won’t be able to track us through these parameters. In the meantime, advertisers can utilize the Private Click Measurement system. It allows tracking conversion metrics of advertising campaigns without revealing individual user activity.
Clearly, this is better privacy for us and the same results for advertisers and privacy platforms. It’s a significant triumph for all users and gradually bringing positive change to one of the world’s largest industries.
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