Comment by HatchedLake721 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by HatchedLake721 | Hacker News Reader

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Sorry, did you read Mozilla's blog post or aware of what IDFA is and it's history?

Apple released IDFA to improve consumer privacy, to avoid advertisers being able to fingerprint iOS devices using Unique Device ID (UDID).

Access to UDID was deprecated in iOS 5 (that's 2011).

It has also given control to consumers since then to opt-out of providing IDFA by default.

In 2019, Mozilla asked Apple to take rotate the IDFA every month.

But Apple has taken it even further, which Mozilla publicly applauded https://foundation.mozilla.org/en/blog/applause-for-apples-i...

Apple is now making IDFA disabled by default and requiring users to enable it if they want to.

> Apple went even further than what Mozilla supporters had asked for when it announced that it will give consumers the option to opt-out of tracking in each app, essentially turning off IDFA and giving millions of consumers more privacy online.

actually... I did wrong quote so joke on me! The quote that I wanted is this one

> That’s where you come in: We need a massive outpouring of support for Apple’s decision to help strengthen its resolve to protect consumer privacy.

Why mozilla needs people like me and you in order for apple to fulfil their promises for consumer privacy?

As apple says “Privacy. That’s iPhone”, why it needs user attention for apple actions?

I think you misunderstood Mozilla.

Apple is still going ahead with this regardless. My understanding the rollout was delayed because of ongoing financial hardship on everyone in the world because of COVID (and to give more time to advertisers, developers and others to prepare).

Mozilla is also asking everyone to publicly support Apple's decision because it's good for consumers, which in result would also force others to also adopt it (Android), but also because on the other end of this decision are advertisers, game developers and Facebook that are publicly telling everyone it's a bad thing since it'll hit their wallets.

ok, that is one way to look at this... I've just disabled IDFA on my phone now!

Thanks for having nice conversation! :)

You too, thanks! Here's what we exactly talked about by the way https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25441986

Making noise about issues helps them getting fixed at several level. If people are aware, they can factor it in their purchase decision, they can get some support for some regulations, good publicity is an incentive for some companies to behave, etc. Mozilla is just encouraging people to support this type of initiative, it does not mean that Apple is bad just because they do something that their users like.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com