Poland investigates Apple privacy rules and mobile advertising dominance
The President of the Polish Office of Competition and Consumer Protection (UOKiK) has opened antitrust proceedings against three Apple entities – Apple, Apple Operations International, and Apple Distribution International – in relation to the App Tracking Transparency (ATT) framework introduced in iOS and iPadOS from version 14.5. The authority is examining whether the design and implementation of Apple’s privacy policy for these operating systems constitute an abuse of a dominant position in breach of EU-style competition standards. The focus is not on data protection law as such, but on the competitive effects of the ATT framework within Apple’s ecosystem.
Apple operates simultaneously as device and operating system provider, app publisher, and mobile advertising service provider. In this dual position, Apple both competes with independent app publishers in the advertising market and sets the rules for access to user data on its platforms. UOKiK questions Apple’s own definition of “tracking”, which covers cross-app data combinations by third parties, but excludes Apple’s equivalent data practices from that label. This asymmetry is reflected in the consent interfaces: third-party apps trigger prompts asking users whether they allow the app “to track” them, whereas Apple’s own services request consent for “personalised advertising”.
According to UOKiK, the wording and visual design of the consent prompts may nudge users to refuse tracking by third parties but to accept Apple’s data use for advertising. The effect is that identical profiling activities – serving personalized ads based on user behavior and preferences – are framed differently in the user interface. One practical example cited is a user who grants Apple a single consent to “personalised advertising” across its ecosystem, but declines “tracking” for third-party apps, despite the substantive similarity of the underlying data processing. The President of the Polish Data Protection Authority has confirmed, in an opinion requested by UOKiK, that ATT does not directly stem from data protection legislation.
The suspected conduct may distort competition in the mobile advertising and app distribution markets by placing independent publishers at a structural disadvantage in obtaining user consent and access to data. Reduced access to data for third-party developers may lower the value of their advertising inventory and weaken their bargaining position with advertisers, particularly affecting smaller and local, including Polish, undertakings. UOKiK suspects that Apple may have overstated the privacy benefits of ATT while simultaneously reinforcing its own competitive position, potentially amounting to an abuse of dominance punishable by a fine of up to 10% of global turnover under EU-aligned competition rules. Parallel scrutiny of Apple’s ATT framework by authorities in Germany, Italy, Romania and the French decision imposing a €150,000,000 fine underscore the broader EU-level enforcement focus on platform self-preferencing and data-related competition concerns.
