Italy’s antitrust watchdog has just handed Apple a massive fine, and the reason hits close to home for anyone who has ever seen those “Allow App to Track?” pop-ups on their iPhone.
The Italian Competition Authority (AGCM) announced that it has fined Apple over €98 million (roughly $145 million CAD) for abusing its dominant position in the app market. The investigation, which has been ongoing since 2023, focused on Apple’s App Tracking Transparency (ATT) policy.
When Apple introduced ATT in 2021, it required all third-party developers to ask for permission before tracking user data across other apps and websites. According to the AGCM, Apple’s implementation was “unfair and disproportionate.”
The regulator found that because Apple’s own prompt didn’t quite meet the strict requirements of European privacy laws, developers were often forced to show a second, separate pop-up to stay legal. This “double consent” requirement frustrated users and led many to simply click “No” to everything. Meanwhile, the AGCM claims Apple’s own apps and services didn’t face the same hurdles, giving the tech giant an unfair advantage in the digital advertising space.
For many app creators, personalized advertising is how they keep their apps free. When users opt out of tracking, the value of that ad space drops. The Italian investigation found that Apple’s policy led to lower revenues for third-party developers while Apple’s own advertising business actually saw a boost.
“The terms were found to be disproportionate to the achievement of the company’s stated data protection objectives,” the AGCM stated in its ruling. Essentially, the regulator believes Apple could have protected user privacy without making it so difficult for other companies to compete.
Unsurprisingly, Apple is not taking this sitting down. A spokesperson for the company stated that they “strongly disagree” with the decision and plan to appeal. Apple maintains that the rules apply equally to everyone and that the goal has always been to give users a simple way to control their own data.
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Regulators siding with companies wanted to harvest data from users to feed their surveillance economy model over consumers desire for privacy.
Can’t wait for the carney to import this. We need even more over regulation that harms consumers. /s