Apple must face narrowed privacy lawsuit over its apps

A U.S. federal judge narrowed a lawsuit accusing of violating the privacy of iPhone, iPad, and Apple Watch users by collecting their personal data through proprietary apps such as the App Store, Apple Music, and Apple TV.
Jonathan Stempel for Reuters:
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U.S. District Judge Edward Davila in San Jose, California, dismissed nearly all claims based on the “Allow Apps to Request to Track” setting on Apple mobile devices, but let some claims proceed over the “Share [Device] Analytics” setting.
Mobile device users said Apple violated their user agreements and several privacy and consumer protection laws by assuring that disabling the settings would limit its collection, storage and use of their data – only to then ignore their choices and collect, store and use that data.
In a 39-page decision late Thursday, Davila said Apple made clear to users that the “Allow Apps to Request to Track” setting applied to “other companies’ apps and websites.”
He said that made it “implausible” for reasonable people to believe that by turning the setting off, they were withdrawing consent for Apple to collect their data through its own apps.
But the judge said users plausibly alleged they withdrew such consent by disabling the “Share [Device] Analytics” setting, citing Apple’s disclosure that users may “disable the sharing of Device Analytics altogether.”

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MacDailyNews Note: For Mac users, here’s how to opt out of sharing analytics:
You can opt out of sharing analytics from your Mac at any time.

Choose Apple menu > System Settings, click Privacy & Security in the sidebar, then click Analytics & Improvements on the right. (You may need to scroll down.)
Turn off Share Mac Analytics.
Turn off “Share with app developers” to stop sharing analytics data with app developers.

How to view analytics information on your Mac:
You can use the Console app to view analytics information sent to Apple.
• Open the Console app on your Mac.
• Click Mac Analytics Data in the sidebar.
• Console shows analytics information even if you did not select to send reports automatically.
• Log messages that have SubmitDiagInfo in the Process column indicate when analytics information was sent to Apple.
If you’re signed in as an administrator user, you can view all reports. If you’re not signed in as an administrator, you can only view User Reports.
All analytics information is sent to Apple anonymously.
More info about Apple’s analytics and privacy here.

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