"All roads lead to advertising" - this is a sentence often seen by netizens during the just-concluded "Double Eleven" shopping festival. When you open an app, albeit with only a slight adjustment, it's likely that you've triggered the "Shake" ad redirect to another shopping page.
Recently, according to Times Financial News, insiders from major Internet companies revealed that Apple has notified a number of domestic head apps, asking them to remove gyroscope permissions, and "shake" jump ads may be banned. After that, the top app companies may release a new version that cancels the "Shake" jump advertising function.
In this regard, Nandu reporters asked a number of head App companies respectively, and Sina Weibo said that it had not received relevant news for the time being, and Douyin, Zhihu, etc. did not have a clear answer.
What do you think of Apple's decision to ban the App "Shake" function? Are the gyroscope permissions and accelerometer permissions invoked by the "Shake" function personal information? If Apple really implements this measure, what impact will it have on the App advertising business and content ecosystem?
Dissatisfied with the frequent jump of "shake", some users have complained to Apple
On the evening of November 13, the entry "Apple will prohibit shake jump ads" rushed to the top five on the Weibo hot search list. According to Times Finance and Economics, an insider from a major Internet manufacturer said that since November, Apple has notified a number of domestic head apps, requiring them to remove gyroscope permissions, and "shake" jump ads will be banned. In addition, in the future, the company may release and launch a new version of the app without "shake" jump ads, and the specific release time has not been determined.
As soon as this news came out, it attracted widespread attention. As of the next evening, the topic had been read more than 360 million times on Weibo. "This wave is very Apple, absolutely support" "It is recommended that other mobile phone brands follow suit"... Most of the comments expressed support for Apple's move on the Internet.
After the news that Apple or "shake it" ignited the Internet, related topics on the Zhihu App also rushed to the headlines, and one of the netizens with the ID of "Blue Little Gray" replied that it was on the hot list and received tens of thousands of likes.
It turned out that Lan Xiaoshen posted a complaint letter sent to Apple's secure mailbox, which reflected the phenomenon of too frequent jumps in some App opening ads in China, and suggested that Apple restrict App access to gyroscope permissions and other behaviors. In the comment area of the answer, there are also many netizens who claim to have made complaints.
Screenshot of Zhihu netizen Lan Xiaogray's answer
Lan Xiaogray told the reporter that for Apple, the Chinese market is very important, if "shake" seriously affects the user experience, and even becomes one of the factors for users to consider when choosing a mobile phone brand in the future, Apple, which has always taken the protection of personal information security as a brand advantage, will naturally pay attention to the relevant situation.
"Users still have to fight for their rights, and one or two whistleblower letters may not force Apple to take action, but if they have a lot of evidence in front of them, Apple will have to start looking into the problem." ”
It's understandable that users want a clean and simple Internet environment, so from a legal point of view, how should we view Apple's measures online?
Wang Yuan, a partner at Beijing Gaoqin Law Firm, told the reporter that the "Personal Information Protection Law" clearly stipulates the collection and use of personal information by apps, and the "Measures for the Administration of Internet Advertising" also requires that users must not be deceived or misled to click and browse advertisements. The app's abuse of the "shake" function, in which the user automatically jumps to the landing page without obvious shaking, obviously fails to ask for personal consent, and goes against the user's true will.
Ma Ce, co-founder of Zhejiang Kenting Law Firm, said that at present, mainland laws and regulations do not make clear provisions on "shake" advertisements, and Apple's move is not to meet legal requirements, but a rectification measure implemented by the platform for business ecological considerations. "It's not banned, it's just that it could be restricted. ”
He further pointed out that Apple's move is above the legal standard, and while it is conducive to improving the user experience, it does not mean that there is a problem with apps that adopt the "shake" advertising model. It is interesting to see what trigger criteria represent the true intentions of users. "I think it's a natural competition, and Apple can do this to make its app market more friendly and more competitive. If other manufacturers don't change this and lose the trust of users, they will also change. ”
What would be the impact if Apple restricts "shake" ads?
Open an app, and jump to a third-party page with a slight flick of your hand, and now the "shake" advertising model has long been common in major apps.
In April this year, in order to understand the ease of triggering the App's "shake" advertisement, the reporter from Nandu selected a total of 12 life service and social information apps from the head and central as the evaluation objects, all of which have the "shake" opening screen advertising function. The evaluation results show that there are 10 apps that are more likely to trigger "shake" ads, accounting for more than 80%. This feature can be triggered in everyday life scenarios such as picking up a mobile phone, running, walking, etc.
"Shake It" controversy series
After more than half a year, recently, a reporter from Nandu once again tested these 12 apps and found that the problem of "shake" ads being easy to trigger has been improved to a certain extent. However, during major promotion activities such as "Double 11", the phenomenon of domestic mainstream apps being criticized for jumping too frequently is still serious, and the degree of triggering may vary depending on the time stage.
Ma Ce told the reporter that most of the head apps now use the "shake" advertising function, which proves that the model of opening screen ad jump can indeed increase monetization and increase revenue, and it is likely to occupy a high proportion, "This has become a common business model in the industry." ”
Previously, some Internet company advertising-related practitioners told Nandu reporters that since 2021, with the increase of regulatory governance, "hidden close buttons" and "pop-up" opening screen advertisements have been rectified, but the click-through rate of opening screen ads has also declined. The "shake" method is adopted, and the interaction cost is relatively low, hoping to increase the click-through rate of the open screen advertisement, so as to maintain the platform's income.
According to another well-known Internet company's advertising-related practitioners, splash ads are mainly sold in the form of contracts, that is, when customers buy traffic, they book exposure with the platform, and the click-through rate is an important factor affecting the willingness of splash screen advertising brand owners to cooperate.
With App splash ads so common, what impact might Apple's implementation of the ban on the App advertising business and content ecology have?
Lan Xiaoshen told the reporter that the app's "shake" function is now abused, which is the embodiment of "bad money drives out good money". Once there are apps on the market that use Shake and generate higher economic benefits, other apps will naturally join the race, and the vast majority of apps will start using Shake. Apple, as the policymaker of the App ecosystem, if "Shake It" is uniformly banned, the competition of all apps will return to the same level, and the relative advantages of traditional advertising in the past will not be weakened.
Zhu Yunyang, director and partner of Beijing Qinglu Law Firm, told a reporter from Nandu, "If Apple's app distribution platform prohibits 'shake', this is not an action on the regulatory side, but an act of the application platform." From the perspective of the ecology of the Internet, advertising is actually one of the factors for the sustainable development of the Internet. So this model of advertising was canceled or even disappeared, and new advertising models will soon appear. ”
The hand trembled and jumped, and some users sued the platform for compensation of 1 yuan in the first instance
As we all know, advertising is the main source of income for internet platforms. For the sake of revenue, the platform hopes to increase the number of ad impressions and clicks through various ways, so that the ads are frequently exposed to attract users' attention. But if you don't take into account the real wishes of the user at all, similar to the form of frequent jumps to third-party pages with a flick of your hand, it will naturally cause controversy. Nandu reporters noticed that users' dissatisfaction with the "shake" advertisement has reached a certain level, and in addition to complaining to the distribution platform, some people also choose to resort to legal rights protection.
In April this year, Nandu exclusively reported that Wuhan University students sued the "Meitu App" App for "Shake It" advertisements that were not actively triggered but frequently jumped, and were compensated 1 yuan in the first instance. The court held that the App's "Shake It" splash screen advertisement had relevant deceptive and misleading behaviors and forced click-to-jump, which had indeed infringed the plaintiff's right to choose independently and actually caused the loss of its data traffic, and required the company to which the App belonged to stop the infringement and set the interactive action parameters that triggered the user's jump in compliance. However, since "shake" app open ads are not prohibited by industry norms, the requirement to remove the app open ad format is not supported.
A student at South China University of Technology also took Baidu to court for similar reasons, and in May ushered in the first-instance verdict. The court held that Baidu's failure to provide users with the option to turn off the "shake" function of the app open advertisement infringed on the plaintiff's rights and interests in personal information and the right to make its own choice. Since Baidu had made relevant rectifications before the trial, the court rejected all of the plaintiff's claims.
It is worth noting that whether the two permissions invoked by the "Shake" function, the gyroscope and the accelerometer permission, are personal information is one of the key to the trial of the above two cases, and the first-instance judgment found that the accelerometer information belongs to the plaintiff's personal information. Legal experts in the field of practice also have their own views on this issue.
In Ma Ce's view, firstly, the two permissions of gyroscope and accelerometer have nothing to do with personal privacy, and secondly, the information they collect may not be personal information, because after obtaining the above permissions, their access behavior is limited to the function itself and will not be associated with other personal information. "If it's just linking an app and accessing the relevant information on that fixed app, I don't think there is a question of personal information. ”
Wang Yuan said that according to the recommended national standard "Guidelines for the Application and Use of Mobile Internet Application (App) System Permissions", the sensor is not identified as a sensitive permission, but the information collected by the sensor may be sensitive information.
The Personal Information Protection Law stipulates that biometric and medical health information is sensitive personal information, and when the user holds the device, the speed, angle, duration and other information of its movements should also be medical and health information, and can be used as biometric information to identify individuals, and the collection and use of the device must be subject to the user's separate consent. In addition, enabling sensor permissions should also be related to app functions, and in general, only health monitoring or sports apps need to enable this permission.
Nandu reporters found that the industry has tried to standardize the "shake" opening screen advertisement. In November last year, the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology, the Telecom Terminal Industry Association, together with the Thiel Certification Center Co., Ltd. and a number of enterprises, formulated and issued the "APP User Rights Protection Evaluation Specification Part 7: Deception, Misleading and Coercive Behavior" T/TAF 078.7-2022, which refines the parameter setting parameters of "deception, misleading and forced click to jump", including triggering the jump parameter setting acceleration is not less than 15m/s², the rotation angle is not less than 35°, and the operation time is not less than 3s.
Not only that, but regulators are also taking action. In February this year, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology issued the "Notice on Further Improving the Service Capabilities of Mobile Internet Applications", which proposed that users should not be induced to operate by means of "full-screen heat maps" and high-sensitivity "shake" that are easy to cause false triggers, and that the opening screen and pop-up window information windows should provide clear and effective close buttons to ensure that users can close them conveniently.
Producer: Nandu Digital Economy Governance Research Center
Written by: Nandu reporter Fan Wenyang
【Further Reading】