76% of users dislike receiving targeted ads and want companies to stop this practice.
Recently, major tech companies have been revising their privacy policies for user data. Apple made massive changes in iOS 14.5, making it much more difficult for app developers to collect user data. Google intends to do the same with the release of Android 12. The company will continue to track its users, but will not openly provide it to its partners.
According to a study by the company Invisibly, 82% of people surveyed by it approve of the restrictions on the collection of user data. What’s more, 76% of respondents dislike receiving targeted ads and want companies to stop doing so. According to 68% of survey participants, data confidentiality is very important.
With the release of iOS 14.5 in April of this year, Apple obliged app developers to ask users for permission to track their online activities. According to Invisibly, as of May 16, only 15% of users have given this permission.
Interestingly, some apps collect more data than others. For example, in the category “Messengers and video calls”, Facebook Messenger is the leader in collecting the personal data of users. Cisco Webex Meetings collects the least data. Accordingly, in the Social Media category, Facebook collects the most data. Clubhouse collects the least amount of user data. In the “Navigation” category, Waze GPS takes the first place, while InRoute does not transmit any data at all.
Obviously, the most popular applications collect the most data. However, there are applications that don’t need any data. In order to survive, they charge a user fee or offer in-app purchases.
Among other things, the study shows that social media and food delivery apps collect more data than others. The top 5 also includes shopping, dating and payments apps, followed by flight booking services, menstrual tracking apps, instant messengers and video calls, streaming and financial services.
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