Auctioning Mobile User Data Is Less Viable Than Ever

A big secondary market for mobile advertising is selling device data to other advertisers (it’s also technically a black market when it happens on the dark web with stolen data, but there’s a legitimate version, too). Now bids for iOS data don’t really have anywhere to go – how can you bid on a list of device use information when that data isn’t being collected anymore? And if someone is selling that data, how do you know if it’s not outdated or just fake?

These secondary auction markets and “demand-side platforms” (DSPs) have been facing pressure in recent years over fears they aren’t exactly healthy for the industry. Apple nixing the IDFA won’t end them, but it will refocus the secondary selling on top-level data (the kind we discussed in the points above) and less on more personal user data.