Gadgets
Apple App Store Privacy Labels: All You Need to Know
What are privacy labels?
Apple updated App Store policies to help users better understand an app’s privacy practices before they download the app on any Apple platform. On each app’s product page, users can learn about some of the data types an app may collect, and whether that data is linked to them or used to track them. This information can be found on the every app listing under the App Privacy section. Data is categorised into purchases, location, contact info, contacts, user content, search history, identifiers, usage data, diagnostics, and more.
This section gives you clarity on why the data is collected. It lets you know whether the app is collecting data for third-party advertising, developer’s advertising or marketing, analytics, product personalisation, improve app functionality, or other purposes.
Where can you find the new feature?
Unfortunately, the App Store privacy labels are not very easy to discover. Users who aren’t aware of the change may not even notice it, as it sits below sections like Screenshots, Description, What’s New, and Ratings and Reviews.
However, it is helpful in a time when concerns around data collection have become increasingly important. And while Apple is taking these details from the developers and not checking them independently, it has said that developers who are reported by the community for not admitting to the data collected will face consequences.
What do these labels contain?
This new App Privacy section will contain the name of the developer and a list of all the data that may be collected or linked to you and the data that is used to track you. For instance, Facebook is listed to use your contact information like physical address, email address, name, phone number and identifiers like User ID and Device ID to track you across apps and websites owned by other companies.
Users can click on the ‘See Details‘ option in the corner of the App Privacy section to see a more detailed breakdown of all of the data that is used and collected by any app.
Types of data have been categorised below:
- Contact Info – name, email address, phone number, physical address, other user contact info.
- Health and fitness – Health and medical data, including but not limited to data from the Clinical Health Records API, HealthKit API, MovementDisorderAPIs, or health-related human subject research or any other user provided health or medical data. Fitness and exercise data, including but not limited to the Motion and Fitness API.
- Financial info – Payment information like payment card number or bank account number, credit score, salary, income, assets, debts, or any other financial information.
- Location – precise location and coarse location.
- Sensitive info – Such as racial or ethnic data, sexual orientation, pregnancy or childbirth information, disability, religious or philosophical beliefs, trade union membership, political opinion, genetic information, or biometric data.
- Contacts – Such as a list of contacts in the user’s phone, address book, or social graph.
- User Content – emails or text messages, photos or videos, audio data, gameplay content, customer support, other user content.
- Browsing History – Information about content the user has viewed that is not part of the app, such as websites.
- Search History – Information about searches performed in the app.
- Identifiers – User ID such as screen name, handle, account ID, assigned user ID, customer number, or other user- or account-level ID that can be used to identify a particular user or account. Device ID such as the device’s advertising identifier, or other device-level ID.
- Purchases – An account’s or individual’s purchases or purchase tendencies
- Usage Data – product interaction such as app launches, taps, clicks, scrolling information, music listening data, video views, saved place in a game, video, or song, or other information about how the user interacts with the app. Advertising data such as information about the advertisements the user has seen.
- Diagnostics – Crash data such as crash logs, performance data such as launch time, hang rate, or energy use, and other diagnostic data collected for the purposes of measuring technical diagnostics related to the app.
- Other Data Types – Any other data types not mentioned.
Data usage has been segmented into different purposes:
- Third-Party Advertising – Data used displaying third-party ads in your app, or sharing data with entities who display third-party ads.
- Developer’s Advertising or Marketing – Data used for displaying first-party ads in your app, sending marketing communications directly to your users, or sharing data with entities who will display your ads.
- Analytics – Using data to evaluate user behavior, including to understand the effectiveness of existing product features, plan new features, or measure audience size or characteristics.
- Product Personalisation – Customising what the user sees, such as a list of recommended products, posts, or suggestions.
- App Functionality – Data used to authenticate the user, enable features, prevent fraud, implement security measures, ensure server up-time, minimize app crashes, improve scalability and performance, or perform customer support.
- Other Purposes – Any other purposes not listed.
What do developers have to do?
Because of this new mandate, app developers are required to submit privacy information when submitting new apps or app updates to the App Store. Some data is optional to disclose if it meets specific criteria, such as certain data from health research apps and regulated financial services. If account holders and admins need help in entering these responses in App Store Connect, they can learn the basics from this Apple Support page.
A total breakdown on types of data to help developers compare them to the data collection practices in their app can be found here. Developers are also advised to share a public link of their privacy policy. Apple also notes that admins can update their answers at any time without resubmitting the app or going through App Review.
Gadgets
Microsoft Partners With Inworld to Bring AI Game Development Tools to Xbox
“At Xbox, we believe that with better tools, creators can make even more extraordinary games,” Haiyan Zhang, GM, Xbox Gaming AI, said in a blog post. “This partnership will bring together: Inworld’s expertise in working with generative AI models for character development, Microsoft’s cutting-edge cloud-based AI solutions including Azure OpenAI Service, Microsoft Research’s technical insights into the future of play, and Team Xbox’s strengths in revolutionizing accessible and responsible creator tools for all developers.”
The aforementioned AI design copilot is a toolset that will help game designers turn prompts into scripts and dialogue trees. In contrast, the character runtime will enable dynamically generated plot beats and quests. We’ve already seen heavy AI integration in games by way of procedural generation — a more recent example being the 1000+ planets in Starfield. Not to mention, enemy AI has been around for way longer.
Inworld made headlines in August when it launched a modded story mode for Grand Theft Auto V, Sentient Streets, in which players had to investigate the rise of a bizarre AI-worshipping cult — a segment loaded with characters that spoke in AI-generated dialogue, on the fly. The mod was later taken down by publisher Take-Two, leaving a permanent strike on the creator Bloc’s YouTube channel. As per The Verge, Inworld’s AI technology can also be used for narration in top-down RPGs to warn players about any events awaiting off-screen and respond to questions like we’ve seen in the past year with AI chatbots like ChatGPT and Bing Chat. Microsoft has also been heavily banking on artificial intelligence, having made a $10 billion (about Rs. 83,254 crore) investment in OpenAI. The company has also integrated AI tools into its popular suite of services and also added an AI copilot to Windows.
Despite being a Microsoft-affiliated AI toolset, it would be interesting to see whether titles using them will be allowed to thrive on other platforms. In July, Valve claimed that it would be cracking down on games that included AI-generated assets if the developer didn’t own the copyright to the piece of art. For the uninitiated, when you insert a prompt to create something in AI, the software simply repurposes existing assets found online and mushes them together — basically stealing from other artists and writers without appropriate commercial licenses. Infringing them would lead to the game not being distributed on Steam, forcing the developers to seek proper licenses for the asset by reaching out to the AI companies involved. It’s unclear how Microsoft’s partnership will play out — as long as AI content is being used as a catalyst to innovate and create something new, it should be fine.
Gadgets
BSNL Offers Free 4G SIM Upgrade: Here’s How to Get It
In a post on X shared by BSNL’s Andhra Pradesh (@bsnl_ap_circle) unit, the company confirmed that BSNL users can upgrade their older 2G or 3G SIMs to a 4G SIM for free. Not only will the upgrade be free, but a promotional image shared with the post suggests that users who opt for the upgrade will also receive 4GB of free data that will be valid for three months. It is speculated that BSNL is aiming to boost its upcoming 4G services with this offer. The announcement was first spotted by Telecom Talk.
To access the free data offer and the free upgrade, BSNL users are requested to get in touch with executives at BSNL’s Customer Service Centre, franchisee or retailer stores, or contact one of their Direct Selling Agents (DSA). The promo image also adds in a finer print that the offer is available with certain terms and conditions, but hasn’t detailed any, so far.
Reliance’s Jio recently launched the 4G-supported Bharat B1 feature phone in India. The handset is priced at Rs. 1,299 in India. Alongside 4G connectivity, the phone comes with JioCinema and JioSaavn applications pre-installed.
The Jio Bharat B1 is equipped with the JioPay application, which is said to allow users to make UPI payments. Aiming to increase accessibility, the phone supports 23 languages overall, including multiple regional languages.
Gadgets
Realme GT 5 Pro Teased to Feature 3,000 Nits Display; More Details Revealed
Realme, via Weibo, announced the arrival of the Realme GT 5 Pro in China. The display of the handset is confirmed to offer 3000 nits peak brightness. It has also been teased to offer heat dissipation with a surface area of around 10,000mm2. It is confirmed to ship with Qualcomm’s new Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 SoC. The post doesn’t specify the exact launch date of the smartphone, however, given the release of the teasers, the launch could be just around the corner.
The Realme GT 5 Pro has been in the news a lot lately. It is expected to feature a 6.78-inch (1,264×2,780 pixels) AMOLED display and is tipped to come in 8GB, 12GB, and 16GB RAM options along with 128GB, 256GB, 512GB, and 1TB inbuilt storage options.
For optics, the Realme GT 5 Pro is said to have a triple rear camera unit comprising two 50-megapixel sensors and an 8-megapixel shooter at the rear. The camera setup might include a Sony LYTIA LYT808 sensor, an OmniVision OV08D10 secondary sensor, and a Sony IMX890 telephoto sensor. For selfies, there could be a 32-megapixel sensor at the front. It is said to carry a 5,400mAh battery with support for 100W wired charging and 50W wireless charging.
The Realme GT 5 Pro is expected to come with upgrades over Realme GT 5. The latter was launched in China in August with a price tag of CNY 2,999 for the base model with 12GB of RAM and 256GB of storage.
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