Apple is attempting to put more clear blue water between its privacy practices and those of Google and Facebook by unveiling plans for a new super secure ‘Sign in with Apple’ service to help its customers protect their identity from data slurping companies.
The service, which was unveiled at the company’s WWDC 2019 conference this week, lets users log into apps using their AppleID and will reportedly make it far more difficult for companies to use sign-in data for tracking and marketing purposes.
Apple senior vice president of software Craig Federighi said: “Some apps may want your name and maybe even an email to send you information when you’re outside the app.
"We do allow them to request this information, but check this out – you can choose to share your actual email address, or, you can choose to hide it, and when you do, we’ll create a new unique, random address that forwards messages to your real address.”
Apple is also beefing up its privacy policy for permissions as well. The update means users can opt to force iOS apps and services to request access to user data on a case-by-case basis. This will stop certain apps having continued access to iPhone and iPad users’ data, Apple says.
The revamp is the latest salvo in Apple’s quest to take the higher ground on privacy. In June 2018, the firm declared that it would launch new versions of its iOS and Mac operating systems that would halt the data gathering activities of Facebook and other rivals.
Meanwhile, chief executive Tim Cook has called for the US to introduce GDPR-style legislation, arguing that American citizens should have the right to track the data that is being collected about them online and delete it if they want to.
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