“Hidden” iPhone page shows which apps are tracking your Internet searches- Technology News, Firstpost

FP StaffJul 08, 2022 16:14:37 IST

Whether it is iOS or Android, several apps on both of these ecosystems routinely collect a user’s personal data and share it with advertisers. Now, sharing a few basic data would have been fine, but most of these apps collect all sorts of user activities. 

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From their interests on social media to what a user searches for in their browser or other apps, everything gets recorded.

Privacy, has become a myth. As much as they would like to deny it, Apple’s iOS and iPhones are full of apps that are capable of following your activity across other apps and the internet as you browse it.

What’s even worse is most of the data that gets collected, is sold to other companies, meaning you lose out on privacy while big businesses profit. Moreover, this data is then used for social engineering, and to cajole users into behaving in a certain way.

By giving you a unique ‘advertising ID’, apps are able to track your online movements and serve up personalised ads – which is often why you’ll see an advert for something you were looking at previously online.

Fortunately, there’s a hidden list on the iPhone that tells you exactly which apps are following you around the Internet—and gives you an option to block them from doing so.

There’s even a new iPhone update which will require you to give apps permission to track your activity when you open them.

To turn off app tracking, you just have to open your iPhone Settings app then tap ‘Privacy’ and hit ‘Tracking’ at the top.

This will give you access to a massive list of apps, all of which gather data on you. You can then tap on them to disable tracking on individual apps, or even hit a button that switches off ad tracking for all apps.  

It comes amid a wider privacy push from Apple after CEO Tim Cook said last year that “we believe users should have the choice over the data that is being collected about them and how it’s used”.