Thursday, January 28, 2021
Not just because of data protection
Zuckerberg attacks Apple
Apple wants to make data collection on iPhones more difficult. Mark Zuckerberg doesn't like that. After all, personalized advertising is Facebook's business model, and that should make it much more difficult. The Facebook boss also fears that Apple's Messenger will distort competition.
So far, Facebook has grown unchecked in the corona pandemic. But the world's largest online network is preparing for headwinds from two directions: from Apple and from the EU. The iPhone company has worried Facebook for months with its plan to give users more control over their privacy. Now Facebook boss Mark Zuckerberg attacked Apple more sharply than ever before. In the European Union, Facebook sees the legal situation surrounding the transfer of data to the USA as a factor of uncertainty.
Apple wants to give users new options in the coming months to limit data collection on iPhones. It will be easier for you to prevent apps and advertising services from collecting information about their behavior across the boundaries of individual applications and websites. Apple's plan is that every app has to ask users for permission to access it.
Facebook fears that the less knowledge about people will make the personalization of advertising less precise. The promise to advertisers to precisely meet the desired target group is a cornerstone of Facebook's business model. Zuckerberg and Facebook had already criticized in recent months that poorer personalized advertising would harm small and medium-sized companies in particular. In the Corona crisis in particular, they are dependent on the online network as a platform for their business. Facebook collects data from various sources "to help small businesses reach their customers more efficiently," Zuckerberg said. This is the allegation that Apple's actions could slow down the entire economy.
"See Apple as Biggest Competitor"
And the Facebook boss went one step further with his criticism. "Apple may claim that they are doing it to help the people – but their steps clearly follow their competitive interests," Zuckerberg said in a conference call with analysts after the latest quarterly figures were presented. "I would like to emphasize that we increasingly see Apple as one of our biggest competitors." In particular, Zuckerberg shot at Apple's chat service iMessage, which competes with Facebook's WhatsApp and Messenger offers. The Apple service is pre-installed on all iPhones and is preferred there, he criticized.
He also attacked Apple's stance on data protection. Thanks to complete encryption, chat content on WhatsApp is basically only available in plain text for those involved, emphasized the Facebook boss. Apple, however, saves iMessage backups by default without end-to-end encryption on its servers if the iCloud service is not switched off. "Apple and governments have the ability to access messages from most people," Zuckerberg said.
WhatsApp recently struggled with users leaving after new data protection rules were published. They fear that more data will be shared with Facebook. Facebook emphasized that the changes should only apply to communication between companies and their customers on WhatsApp. Zuckerberg tried again to "clear up confusion": "This update does not change the privacy of chats with friends and family," he said. "All of these messages have end-to-end encryption, which means we can't see or hear what's being said. And we never will."
User numbers in North America are falling
In the past quarter, no headwind was felt in the Facebook business. Revenue rose a third year over year to just under $ 28.1 billion. In terms of profit, there was a jump of 53 percent to a good 11.2 billion dollars, as Facebook announced after the US market closed on Wednesday. The number of users also continued to grow. 2.8 billion users came to Facebook at least once a month – 60 million more than a year earlier. Daily it was 1.84 billion after 1.82 billion in the final quarter of the previous year. A total of 3.3 billion users per month accessed at least one app from the Facebook group, which also includes Instagram and WhatsApp.
It was noticeable, however, that the number of daily active users in the USA and Canada fell for the second quarter in a row. After 198 million in the second quarter of 2020, it was last 195 million. The region is particularly lucrative for Facebook with an average of over $ 53 in sales per user. In Europe it was recently an average of just under $ 17 per user. Facebook spoke of "significant imponderables" in the future. During the pandemic, they benefited from the general boost in online business. However, should this trend reverse, it will also slow the growth of Facebook's advertising revenue.
In addition, the online network has already warned that, given the rapid growth in the second half of 2020, there will be foreseeable lower growth in the current year. Another factor of uncertainty is the situation regarding data transmission from the European Union. The European Court of Justice also overturned the new data protection agreement "Privacy Shield" last summer. After the attack on the Capitol in Washington by supporters of Donald Trump, Facebook no longer wants to recommend any groups with political topics to users. Politics recently saturated everything – and many users did not want their time on Facebook to be dominated by it.
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