The tech giants have been clashing over a changes coming in
Apple's iOS operating software, which will include a tracking transparency
feature that Facebook claims could cripple its ability to serve up targeted ads
and hurt many businesses.
"It will provide more information about how we use
personalized ads, which support small businesses and keep apps free."
A feud between the Silicon Valley companies heated up last
week as Apple's chief executive implied Facebook's business model promotes
disinformation and violence, and the social network reportedly prepared an
antitrust lawsuit against Apple over control of the App Store.
"As we have said repeatedly, we believe Apple is
behaving anti-competitively by using their control of the App Store to benefit
their bottom line at the expense of app developers and small businesses,"
Facebook told AFP, declining to confirm or deny the report.
Apple chief executive Tim Cook seemed to take aim at
Facebook when he blasted "disinformation and conspiracy theories juiced by
algorithms" during a virtual data privacy conference in Brussels last
week.
Cook did not mention Facebook by name, but skewered business
models built on targeted advertising, which accounts for most of the social
network's revenue.
Facebook chief executive Mark Zuckerberg said during a
recent earnings conference call that Apple was becoming one of his company's
biggest competitors.
"Apple has every incentive to use their dominant
platform position to interfere with how our apps and other apps work, which
they regularly do to preference their own," Zuckerberg said.
"Apple may say that they're doing this to help people
but the moves clearly track their competitive interests."