Facebook ads blast Apple for protecting iPhone users’ privacy

Facebook is running ads Wednesday that blast Apple for protecting iPhone users’ privacy. Facebook claims giving iPhone users more privacy controls will hurt small businesses that rely on users having little or no control over whether they are hit with targeted ads.

Apple’s new feature is expected to dramatically impact the ability of advertisers to target ads as usual, since informed iPhone users likely won’t opt in.

Megan Graham for CNBC:

The company is running print and digital ads in The Wall Street Journal, New York Times and Washington Post that say: “We’re standing up to Apple for small businesses everywhere.” It also has a new website on the change to iOS 14 that affects opt-in for Apple’s ad identifier, the IDFA.

Apple will soon be making a huge change to settings on users’ iPhones in the name of privacy, and it will fundamentally change mobile advertising on those devices. It will take a privacy option that was previously buried deep in users’ phones and put it front and center when they open an app, which is expected to dramatically impact the ability of advertisers to target ads the way they have been since people likely won’t opt in.

MacDailyNews Take: Blasting Apple for protecting iPhone users’ privacy seems like a losing position – to anyone not named Mark Zuckerberg, it seems.

The bottom line: Mark Zuckerberg was smart enough to steal the idea for Facebook, but isn’t smart enough to run Facebook without trampling his users’ privacy.