Categories: Digital IDMobile

The Twitter App Graph feature will track users mobile apps for commercial purposes

Twitter announced app graph, it will now track every mobile app its users have Installed on their smartphones and tables.  Privacy advocates arise.

Twitter announced the implementation of the “app graph” function that will allow the company to provide “more personal Twitter experience” by serving targeted advertisements by serving targeted advertisements. This means that also Twitter, like other giants Google and Facebook will collect users data from their mobile devices.
Twitter announced that it will collect data to deliver tailored content, in particular the company gather information about other applications installed on their mobile devices, an announcement that sounds to the online privacy advocates as a declaration of war.
Twitter will track the apps users are downloading to better understand its habits and preferences, the information will be used for commercial purposes to provide more relevant ads. The data will allow Twitter also to improve its suggestion mechanism to improve users’ Twitter experience by suggesting accounts to follow.
“Tweets, accounts, or other content to your timeline that we think you’ll find especially interesting.“
Twitter assured its users that it will only track applications users have installed, not any data from within the applications. As it said, “We are only collecting the list of applications you have installed. We are not collecting any data within the applications.”
Anyway the company has remarked that it will not collect data within the applications installed by the users remarking that it is always possible to disable the “tailored experience” by adjusting the preferences at any time.
“To help build a more personal Twitter experience for you, we are collecting and occasionally updating the list of apps installed on your mobile device so we can deliver tailored content that you might be interested in.” states Twitter in a post that explain the concept of app graph. “We are only collecting the list of applications you have installed. We are not collecting any data within the applications.”

Twitter has recently updated the mobile app for  iOS platform, adding the “app graph” feature, meanwhile the Android version will be issued the next week.

One of the main things that has infuriated the experts of online privacy it the way Twitter is providing the updates, the app update is “opt-out,“ which means the company will collect user data automatically unless he explicitly tell it otherwise.
“Additionally, if you have previously opted out of interest-based ads by turning on “Limit Ad Tracking” on your iOS device or by adjusting your Android device settings to “Opt out of interest-based ads,” we will not collect your apps unless you adjust your device settings.” continues the company post on the app graph.
Users that are not interested to the app graph feature can turn off it through Twitter app’s settings menu.
Using Twitter for Android:
  • Tap the overflow icon
  • Tap Settings.
  • Tap the account you’d like to adjust.
  • Under Other, you can adjust the setting to Tailor Twitter based on my apps.

Using Twitter for iOS:

  1. From the Me tab, tap the gear icon
  2. Tap Settings.
  3. Tap the account you’d like to adjust.
  4. Under Privacy, you can adjust the setting to Tailor Twitter based on my apps.

Pierluigi Paganini

(Security Affairs –  Twitter App graph, privacy)

Pierluigi Paganini

Pierluigi Paganini is member of the ENISA (European Union Agency for Network and Information Security) Threat Landscape Stakeholder Group and Cyber G7 Group, he is also a Security Evangelist, Security Analyst and Freelance Writer. Editor-in-Chief at "Cyber Defense Magazine", Pierluigi is a cyber security expert with over 20 years experience in the field, he is Certified Ethical Hacker at EC Council in London. The passion for writing and a strong belief that security is founded on sharing and awareness led Pierluigi to find the security blog "Security Affairs" recently named a Top National Security Resource for US. Pierluigi is a member of the "The Hacker News" team and he is a writer for some major publications in the field such as Cyber War Zone, ICTTF, Infosec Island, Infosec Institute, The Hacker News Magazine and for many other Security magazines. Author of the Books "The Deep Dark Web" and “Digital Virtual Currency and Bitcoin”.

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Pierluigi Paganini
Tags: AndroidiOSmobilemobile appsprivacyTwitterTwitter App graph
9 years ago

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