Apple to Tweak Ad-Tracking Prompts After German Competition Scrutiny — Update

By Edith Hancock

Apple will make changes to how it displays prompts for tracking consent in apps to iPhone and iPad users in the European Union, settling a German competition probe into its policy.

The Federal Cartel Office said on Monday it was concerned that Apple's prompts could give the tech giant an unfair advantage over competing app developers and that the company would tweak its tools to remove certain symbols and wording in those requests.

The move settles a 2022 German probe into Apple's so-called App Tracking Transparency Framework, which the company has said allows users to choose whether apps can track their activity for advertising across other apps and websites.

The tech giant has come under fire from European watchdogs in recent years over its app tracking consent policy, which requires third-party app developers to gain users' consent to collect and use data for advertising through a specific prompt.

Apple had offered to make changes to the framework in December last year to ease the German regulator's concerns.

Apple said that it is changing some elements for third-party app access requests, such as graphic display color and allowing formatting changes.

"While we believe the current ATT [App Tracking Transparency] prompt provides a clear, easy-to-understand and effective way to keep users in control of their data--an opinion shared by the German data protection authorities--we have agreed to make changes to the text and formatting of the prompt at the FCO's request," an Apple spokesperson said in a statement.

France's competition regulator fined the company 150 million euros ($173.6 million) in March 2025, saying the way it implements its policy is "neither necessary nor proportionate to Apple's stated objective of protecting personal data." Italian officials also handed Apple a roughly 98.6 million-euro penalty over the app tracking transparency framework in December 2025, a move the company said it would appeal.

"It is key that personal data and privacy are protected effectively when using apps," Andreas Mundt, the regulator's president said, adding that Apple is allowed to put in place user protections that exceed minimum legal requirements. "However, if Apple sets up additional rules within its ecosystem for the use of data, these rules must, under Germany's special abuse provision for large digital companies, not treat its own offerings better than those of its competitors," he said.

The FCO said the company has four months from the decision to implement the changes and will test them with app publishers.

Write to Edith Hancock at edith.hancock@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

August 17, 2026 07:13 ET (11:13 GMT)