Leaf&Core

Facebook Takes Out Full-Page Ad to Whine About Apple’s Privacy Measures

Danielle from Leaf and Core
Reading Time: 5 minutes.

Facebook's newspaper ad. "We're standing up to Apple for small businesses everywhere" is the headline. It continues: "At Facebook, small business is at the core of our business. More than 10 million businesses use our advertising tools each month to find new customers, hire employees, and engage with their communities. Facebook took out a full-page attack ad for Apple in The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and Washington Post. The ad is attacking Apple’s commitment to privacy with a new feature in iOS 14 that will carve away Facebook’s ability to track users.

In iOS 14, users can see what permissions apps require before they even download them. Once downloaded, they need to ask for those permissions. One permission is the ability to track users as they use other apps. Users can now simply deny these apps permission. This prevents Facebook from using the Facebook app, for example, to track your activity in a fitness app. If Facebook wants that data, they’ll have to buy it from the company and try to relate it to you in another way. If you’re using something like Sign in with Apple or multiple email account aliases to log in to various services, then Facebook may not be able to track you at all.

And they’re terrified of that.

Facebook’s entire business relies on tracking users. That’s why they’re asking you to please stand up against Apple’s tyrannical ways. Please protect them and let them… track everything you do online. Small businesses need their invasive ad tracking too! After all, before Facebook violated your privacy, small businesses didn’t exist!

Apple’s New Privacy Features

iOS 14 first started becoming a problem for Facebook back in June. That’s when it revealed that Instagram—one of the social networks Facebook bought rather than compete with—was activating the camera when users weren’t using the camera. Facebook claims it was a bug, but with how much Facebook spies on its users outside of Facebook and its apps, no one trusted Facebook’s response. Few believed that Facebook was just experiencing a “bug” when they activated the camera on Instagram’s home page. Most people thought it was Facebook collecting data for their ads, something they’ve been accused of before. In a few tests, Facebook started suggesting ads related to things people talked about around their Android devices.

Facebook’s not only unhappy that Apple’s revealing when they’re using the camera or microphone. Due to guidelines in iOS 14, Facebook must ask to track users outside of the Facebook app. Google, Amazon, and other large advertisers aren’t happy about this either. Their business models rely on people not realizing that they’re using the app installed on your phone to track your activity and usage in other applications through data sharing programs. iOS 14 lets users stop these apps. This has been Facebook’s largest problem with Apple’s new privacy features: that they can’t spy on you when you’re using other apps like Amazon or Google’s apps.

 

That’s not even their only problem with iOS 14. In iOS 14, the App Store will contain nutrition label-like privacy labels. This will tell you what permissions and data an app will access. Thanks to this, people may decide that Facebook’s app (shown above) is too invasive. They’ll decide to just use the website or not use Facebook at all.

For the record, if you do use Facebook, it should only be through a browser. Use Firefox or Safari to prevent tracking. Firefox on the desktop is especially good because it treats Facebook webpages like they’re running in a completely separate browser, so it can’t access data from other websites.

Facebook Tracks Non-Users

Think you’re safe by not using Facebook? Think again. Former employees report Facebook’s “shadow profiles” track non-users. This way, once a person signs up, they already know a lot about them. They’ll gather data from an existing users’ contacts. With email addresses and phone numbers, they can figure out that a person exists. They can then buy data about that person from Amazon, Google, and other companies, as well as collect information from public records. They can then use this to advertise to that person if they ever sign up for Facebook.

Better privacy controls could make this level of spying on non-users even more difficult.

Mozilla Defends Apple

Mozilla, makers of Firefox, are staunch supporters of privacy. The Firefox browser is one of the most private, safest browsers you can use. Thanks to containers, you can divvy up your web traffic between separate tab containers. Each one functions like its own browser, so they can’t share data. You can log in to Amazon in a Shopping container, and Amazon won’t be able to track you as you go about the web. Facebook traffic is automatically thrown into a container. Firefox also blocks trackers and keeps you away from insecure sites. Really, if you care about your privacy, you shouldn’t be browsing with Google Chrome. That’s a tracker disguised as a browser. Instead, use Firefox or, on macOS, Safari.

Earlier this week, Mozilla released a page defending Apple’s new feature. Their goal is to inform users of what Facebook and other privacy violators are doing, and why companies like Facebook may try to smear Apple over their attempts to protect your privacy.

Facebook took out a full page ad, begging Apple to let them track you when you’re using other apps on your iPhone. Do you want Facebook tracking you in your other apps? Do you want them seeing what profiles you’re swiping on, how long you were looking at exercise equipment on Amazon, or where you were searching in Google Maps?

Mozilla and Apple tend to agree.

Facebook’s Hypocrisy

The United States government is currently suing Facebook for monopolistic practices. Facebook, when they find a competitor, does one of two things. They either use their power over people’s communication to choke out traffic to the website, or they buy it. When Snapchat was growing in popularity, Facebook introduced Stories. When TikTok lured away Gen-Z and younger millennials, Facebook introduced Reels in Instagram.

As for Instagram? Facebook bought it, along with WhatsApp, because of a VPN they bought. Facebook bought a VPN and used it to spy on all of their users’ web traffic. When they saw that people were using Instagram and WhatsApp for features that Facebook had, like chatting, sharing stories, groups, and images, Facebook bought the two companies, rather than compete with them.

Facebook says they’re fighting Apple’s new privacy features because they’re looking out for small businesses. They say it’s to improve the ad experience for them. Facebook couldn’t care less about small businesses. If they did, they’d stop destroying them.

Facebook’s Hurting? Good

“…our [Facebook’s] ability to deliver targeted ads on iOS 14 will be limited. As a result, some iOS 14 users may not see any ads from Audience Network, while others may still see ads from us, but they’ll be less relevant.”

– Facebook

Any time Facebook is unhappy, it usually means something good is happening in the world. From people leaving Facebook to better privacy measures and lawsuits. Facebook’s not going anywhere. This isn’t going to drastically hurt the company, though they claim it could impact their revenue by up to 50%. That number is likely inflated, and assumes that every user will only use Facebook on their mobile device or will be equally safe on the web. It will, however, force Facebook to collect a little less data on iOS users. It’ll make your digital life more safe.

Facebook has lead to far more right-wing ideals in the United States and beyond. You can trace the rise of fascism in the United States and Europe right back to misinformation and propaganda campaigns on Facebook, spread to unsuspecting users. The Rohingya genocide? Facebook’s largely at fault. Continuing racial violence? Also Facebook. The rise of the alt-right and mainstream far-right politicians? Yup. Facebook. It’s hard not to favor anything that causes this company losses.

So now Facebook wants to tell you that they should have the right to track every thing you do, even things you do outside of Facebook, so they can show you ads that will make you wonder if Facebook has been spying on you.

And that’s the problem. They have been. Now that may stop, and I love to watch Facebook squirm.

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