iOS 17, iPadOS 17 and macOS Sonoma will feature a new feature to protect users from advertising surveillance. Previously, the company had already banned applications and websites from collecting data about its users without their consent, and now it has taken up tracking through links.
With the installation of updates on smartphones, tablets and computers, the new Link Tracking Protection feature will automatically turn on. This is a new security measure for the Mail, Messages and Safari applications, which identifies unnecessary parameters in links that can be used for surveillance and removes them.
We are talking about additional parameters that are specified in the link after /?. They allow you to target ads bypassing Apple's protection by collecting data about the user as they move around the site, as well as determining where the user came from to this page.
Apple notes that the implementation of the function will not affect the operation of links. At the same time, marketers will still be able to record the success of advertising campaigns through the new Private Click Measurement tool. It will allow you to create links that will allow specialists to collect general click-through data that cannot be used for targeted advertising and user data collection.
By default, in Safari, this feature will be enabled only in private windows (similar to incognito mode), but in the settings it can be activated for the standard viewing mode.
