PALO ALTO, U.S.– Apple announced a series of software updates to its iPhone, iPad, Mac and Watch at its annual Worldwide Developers Conference on Monday. The U.S. tech giant doubled down on enhancing privacy features across its devices, a move that is expected to further disrupt the online advertisement industry.
While developers from around the world usually gather at Apple’s Silicon Valley headquarter for WWDC, this highly-anticipated week-long event is being held online this year due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Each year, Apple shows off a new version of its iPhone operating system and Monday was no exception. The company is bringing several new privacy features to iOS 15 to make it easier for users to see which apps on the phones are collecting data. Meanwhile, the updated Mail and Safari on iPhone iOS 15 will allow users to browse emails and websites without being tracked.
“Apple’s tightening of privacy options for users is the defining theme for this year’s WWDC and will cause further consternation among those companies’ dependent on user data for tracking, advertising, and monetization,” said Ben Wood, a tech analyst at market research firm CCS Insight.
The App Tracking function Apple announced last year has had a detrimental impact on social media companies and others that rely on an advertisement model as it hinders their ability to collect user data for customized ads.
Users will have more options on privacy.
“This [iOS 15] follows the iOS 14.5 release which has doubled down on privacy features for the consumer at a time when Apple has directly put itself on a collision course with Facebook around the ability for users to block data tracking,” said Dan Ives, managing director at Wedbush Securities.
The new privacy features introduced on Monday — including detailed privacy reports for each app, email tracking block, and Private Relay which routes web traffic through two separate servers to prevent websites identifying who is using the internet — will further disrupt ad-based businesses.
“Hiding information such as IP addresses, location and whether users have opened or read emails could severely limit the way many companies track and monetize users but will be welcomed by consumers who are becoming increasingly aware of how much data is being captured,” said Wood at CCS.
In Monday’s keynote, the tech giant also announced that that it will release a new Mac operating system named Monterey, along with software updates for the iPad and Apple Watch. The company did not unveil any hardware update at this year’s WWDC opening day.
Apple stock closed at $125.90 per share following the event, slightly up from last Friday.
