Apple’s Safari tracking prevention tool is flawed, can compromise user privacy, Google says

  • Google engineers said the Intelligent Tracking Prevention feature on Apple’s Safari web browser is fundamentally flawed and creates more problems than it solves
  • This is not the first time the two tech giants, who own two of the most popular web browsers, have clashed over privacy

The Intelligent Tracking Prevention (ITP) feature on Apple’s Safari web browser is fundamentally flawed, Google engineers said in a paper. Photo: AFP

Google engineers said a tool Apple developed to help users avoid web tracking is fundamentally flawed and creates more problems than it solves.

The Intelligent Tracking Prevention (ITP) feature on Apple’s Safari web browser, which is meant to block tracking software used by digital advertisers, can be abused to do the opposite, according to a paper released Wednesday by Google researchers. Google told Apple about the problem in August, and in December the iPhone maker published a blog post saying it had fixed the issues and thanking Google for its help.

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