Facebook believes that Apple's changes to iOS are one of the reasons for the company's loss of tens of billions of dollars.
Apps must ask iOS users in advance if they want to track data from apps or websites on their device. Photo: Apple |
According to the financial report for the fourth quarter of 2021 just released, Facebook recorded a decline in the number of daily users globally for the first time in a quarter since 2004. Besides, a series of other unfavorable information made shareholders Meta's shares fell more than 23%, or $210 billion, in 24 hours. One of the reasons most mentioned by Meta leaders is Apple.
In the financial report, Dave Wehner, CFO Meta, cited Apple's changes to iOS as one of three reasons affecting Facebook's growth, besides the impact of the economy and the exchange rate.
In a post on his personal page, CEO Mark Zuckerberg also said that new iOS adjustments make the platform have less data to serve personalized ads. "However, people still want to see relevant ads, and businesses want to reach the right customers. So we're rebuilding our advertising infrastructure to continue to deliver quality ads. high," Zuckerberg wrote.
Accordingly, Meta is said to have spent $ 10 billion to rebuild its infrastructure to better display ads to iOS users in the future, directly affecting the company's expected business results. this in 2022.
The App Tracking Transparency feature was brought to iPhone by Apple from iOS 14.5 version. Apps that want to track user activity must ask for permission first. Statistics show that the majority of users choose to opt out. This leaves apps that rely on analytics on user data, like Facebook, without the correct data to serve ads.
According to CNBC, Facebook's applications depend almost entirely on the operating systems of Apple and Google. "When Apple changed its privacy policy, Facebook was stripped of one of its most important assets," the site said.
According to analysts, to avoid depending on other businesses in the real world, Facebook is looking for answers in the virtual world. Developing the metaverse and changing the company's name to Meta is one of the ways for Zuckerberg to make his own rules of the game. In the newly released financial report, the Reality Labs team developing virtual reality technology for Meta has also spent more than 10 billion USD in 2021.