The four social media companies lost an estimated US$9.85 billion, or 12 per cent, in combined revenue in their third and fourth quarters, according to ad-tech company Lotame. (Financial Times)

Talking point: Apple introduced changes in April that require apps to ask users for their permission to track activity across other companies’ apps and websites. When users say no, it blocks the app’s ability to share their data with brokers and third parties to serve targeted ads. Facebook, the company that last week rebranded as Meta, wasn’t happy about the change, which prompted an immediate drop in revenue for companies—some as high as 30 to 40 per cent. The change, however, helped boost Apple’s advertising business, which grew more than threefold in market share in the six months after. That’s prompted some to accuse Apple of breaking its own privacy rules for its benefit.