Apr 26, 2021

Jen King on Apple’s New Mobile Privacy Protections

From NPR

Apple Rolls Out Major New Privacy Protections For iPhones And iPads

By Laurel Wamsley

Starting Monday, iPhone and iPad users will have a simple but powerful new way to control how their data is used.

With Apple's latest software update, iOS 14.5, iPhone and iPad users will now encounter pop-ups in the apps they use, asking whether the user wants to allow the app "to track your activity across other companies' apps and websites." The user can then select whether or not to allow the app to track them and share their data...

Whether Apple's new privacy pop-ups make a big impact will depend on how well users understand what they mean, says Jennifer King, Privacy and Data Policy Fellow at the Stanford Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence.

"It's very hard to know right now if iOS users will understand what this screen is asking them to do and whether they will ask their apps not to track in large enough numbers to have any real effect on revenue," King wrote in an email to NPR.

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Jennifer King is a School of Information alumna (Ph.D. 2018, MIMS 2006). 

Last updated: April 28, 2021