With the release of iOS 8, Apple is empowering customers to manage their privacy settings in more ways than ever. Something that doesn’t sit well with the feds and, more recently, with the developers coding your favorite apps.

The privacy policy changes spawned by the introduction of iOS 8 can be potentially confusing to the user, while at the same time they can limit functionality in apps.

Doctor’s orders

This week, Apple put out two brief announcements for all developers selling iOS apps in the iTunes Store.

One deals with iAd being available in more countries - something that apparently doesn’t even deserve its own headline in the media - the other explaining why some developers (depending on what type of app they sell) are now required to include a new privacy policy in their apps.

It goes like this: “To ensure that customers understand how their data will be used, you must provide a link in the Privacy Policy URL field in iTunes if a privacy policy is required by law in your country or if your app does any of the following,” Apple says.

The list includes: access of general data from the device, requirement to create an account in-app, access to existing user accounts, use of the HomeKit and / or HealthKit frameworks, Apple Pay integration, use of keyboard extensions, auto-renewable subscriptions, and age restrictions.

Read the guidelines again

Apple directs app sellers to the App Store Review Guidelines for the full scoop. The documentation was last changed this year, so for those of you who haven’t consulted the guidelines in a while, it’s probably a good idea to grab a cup of coffee, lay back in your chair and start the tedious reading process.

It’s best to know how to proceed, than to see your app rejected after months of painstaking work on the wrong track.
Developers are frustrated already

If fitness app RunKeeper is any indication, Apple’s new change of heart will impact some developers more than others.

A tool that tracks user actions even when the phone is locked, RunKeeper aggregates valuable activity data to provide stuff like calorie burn, steps taken, when and where they jogged, etc. Because of the new privacy policy, the app now has to ask the user if they want their location data to be accessed even when they’re not using the app. Which may scare them off, according to Runkeeper's Max Freiert.

Freiert regards the prompt as “a confusing and almost nefarious thing.”

“We were frustrated that we had to make this change,” Mr. Freiert relayed to The Information. At the same time, he understands why Apple was forced to instate these policies.

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