Apple has innovative features that always prioritize user privacy. These features, offered in the iOS and macOS ecosystem, provide various solutions for protecting users’ personal data, controlling sharing, and experiencing a more secure digital experience. Here are 10 privacy protection features that reflect Apple’s privacy-focused approach and could be important for every user…
10 Apple Privacy Protections You Should Know
Locking or Hiding an App
Locked and hidden apps prevent users’ private content from being accidentally visible when showing their screens to others or giving their devices to others. Users can lock an app to protect its contents from others or hide it to prevent others from seeing it. Learn how to lock and hide an app.
Choosing Which Contacts an App Can Access
With Contacts Access improvements in iOS 18, Apple allows users to choose which contacts to share instead of giving an app access to all contacts.
Safari Private Browsing Windows are Locked by Default
When users browse in Private Browsing mode, Safari doesn’t remember the pages they visit, search history, or autofill information. Apple has made Private Browsing windows locked by default, so users can keep their tabs open and easily return with FaceID, TouchID, or password.
Link Tracking Protection
Users may notice that some links they visit on the web are tracked with additional information. Link Tracking Protection removes unnecessary trackers from URLs shared in Messages and Mail and provides protection while browsing in Safari Private Browsing.
The Identity Check feature, announced by Google for Android devices, will be rolling out to Samsung Galaxy devices in the coming weeks.
Safety Check
If a user’s personal safety is at risk, Safety Check allows them to quickly stop information sharing or review and update their sharing with individual people and apps. Safety Check also helps users control who they share information with, limit Messages and FaceTime to their iPhone only, change their passwords, and more.
App Privacy Report
The App Privacy Report allows users to see how apps access the data they’ve been permitted to use. When this feature is enabled, users can see details about how often apps access their data – such as location, camera, microphone, and more.
Hide My Email
Offered with iCloud+ subscription, Hide My Email allows users to create unique, random email addresses for apps, websites, and more, keeping their personal email address private. Users can keep their personal email address private when creating a new account with an app, subscribing to an online newsletter, or sending email to someone they don’t know.
Approximate Location
Apple’s location control feature allows users to decide whether apps see their precise location or approximate location. This enables users to use apps for things like finding nearby restaurants or checking the weather while preventing them from sharing more information than necessary.
Recording Indicator Lights
When an app uses the iPhone’s microphone or camera, a Recording Indicator Light appears. An orange dot is shown when the microphone is used, and a green dot when the camera or camera and microphone are used together, so users are aware of what’s being recorded.
iCloud Private Relay
Offered as part of iCloud+ subscription, iCloud Private Relay protects users’ identity and the sites they visit while browsing the web in Safari. This way, no one — not even Apple — can see who users are and which sites they visit.
