Apple’s latest ad campaign is about the Safari browser found on iPhone, iPad and Mac. It’s an entertaining watch but unsparing in its criticism of rival browsers and operating systems, claiming that Safari is fast and private while data companies can track you when you browse on Chrome, for instance.
The Online Tracker Warning
Here’s how the ad pans out: a guy in a library has a person in a silver jumpsuit sitting on his shoulders, like an age-inappropriate piggyback as they browse on their phone — and it’s not an iPhone.
Actually, of course, it’s not silver, it’s chrome: see what they did there? When asked who the guy is, the answer is “Online data tracker, follows me everywhere I browse.”
Then the ad shows other phone users, all with one or more chrome-clad people clinging to them, in an art gallery, on a gym treadmill, at lunch, when camping, at the hairdresser’s.
The point is clear: if you’re not using Safari, you have unwanted data tracking at all times. Apple is saying that other browsers can be tracked across multiple websites while Safari has state-of-the-art protection.
The users with the clingy shoulder-surfers have different phones throughout the ad, though none of them is an iPhone. The first sight of a Cosmic Orange iPhone comes in the final moments.
How do you get data trackers off your back? At the end of the ad, an iPhone user taps Safari and the trackers explode. By the way, there’s no blood: they may look like humans but they’re chrome to the core.
It’s a fun but serious way of pointing out that Safari’s way of doing things makes you safer. These protections include blocking third-party cookies, removing tracking data that many websites try to use and hiding your IP address. Apple also takes action to prevent fingerprinting, where other aspects of your device, right down to the fonts are used to identify you online.
Taking Aim At Chrome
Apple has said that Safari presents a simplified version of your device to trackers, so you’re less distinct. And features like Private Relay offer a VPN where nobody can see your traffic.
At one point, someone points to the tracker’s shiny suit and says, “Ooh, Chrome,” to hammer home the point that the chief rival browser is a major focus here. Apple says Chrome’s Incognito mode doesn’t hide you from trackers.
In other words, even on the iPhone, Safari is best, the company seems to claim.
Will it be enough to encourage people to switch smartphone brands? Maybe, but even if not, it gets you thinking about how private your online activity really is.
All of which is good, and the ad is expertly done. Take a look at the scene in the art gallery and note how beautifully the data trackers perfectly mimic the devils looking over the reader’s shoulders in the classical painting.
Though I would quietly add that if you’re surfing the web in places like an art gallery or on a gym running machine, then in my opinion you deserve everything you get.