[Solved] Can not publish to iOS, problem with NSUserTrackingUsageDescription which is not used

@jane
I went into Thunkable and removed the text from the Tracking Usage Description. I have now successfully submitted the App to the App store for review without any warnings from Apple about tracking.

Perhaps Thunkable can just ensure this field is blank by default

image

3 Likes

Thanks for the update @towball

Hi, the app was not approved.

    1. 1 Performance: App Completeness
    1. 1.2 Legal: Privacy - Data Use and Sharing

Guideline 2.1 - Information Needed

We’re looking forward to completing our review, but we need more information to continue. Your app uses the AppTrackingTransparency framework, but we are unable to locate the App Tracking Transparency permission request when reviewed on iOS 15.1.

Next Steps

Please explain where we can find the App Tracking Transparency permission request in your app. The request should appear before any data is collected that could be used to track the user.

If you’ve implemented App Tracking Transparency but the permission request is not appearing on devices running the latest OS, please review the available documentation and confirm App Tracking Transparency has been correctly implemented.

Resources

Guidelines 2.3 - Accurate Metadata and 5.1.2 - Data Use and Sharing

We’ve identified issues with the app privacy information you provided when you submitted your app for review.

Specifically, your app includes an App Tracking Transparency modal alert to request permission to track users, but you haven’t declared tracking in your app privacy information in App Store Connect.

The app privacy information you provide in App Store Connect must be accurate, to help users understand your app’s privacy practices before downloading it on an Apple platform.

Next Steps

To resolve this issue, revise your app privacy information in App Store Connect to include all of your app’s privacy practices, as well as the privacy practices of any third-party partners. You must have the Account Holder or Admin role to update app privacy information.

Resources

1 Like

Same here. Just tried to submit an update to App Store, and got this:

Unable to Submit for Review

The items below are required to start the review process:

  • Your app contains NSUserTrackingUsageDescription, indicating that it may request permission to track users. To submit for review, update your App Privacy response to indicate that data collected from this app will be used for tracking purposes, or update your app binary and upload a new build. Learn More

I’m not really using any tracking as far as I know, AdMob, GPS, anything. My last successful update was submitted to App Store on Nov 30, so 8 days ago.

So I guess we’re stuck now and waiting for the team to come to the rescue.

@jane @jared

If it’s of any help, here are the components I’m using, besides the basic stuff like labels:

  • Airtable
  • Cloudinary
  • Push notification
  • Camera

And that’s it. Hope we’d get this sorted soon. It’s awful not to be able to publish an update. :confused:

Thank you!

1 Like

Thanks for the info guys. Our team is working on it. We apologize for the inconvenience!

I am looking into this. I will keep you all informed.

Wei

2 Likes

I just deployed a potential fix. Can you please resubmit to Apple again? Let us know the result :wink:

Best,
Wei

2 Likes

Wei
Is there a new version of Thunkable x

I can upload a new one now but want to make sure my version is correct

image

I have resubmitted without any issue, now waiting for Apple review.

Will post the result when Apple have reviewed. A day or two I guess

Okay, good to hear. I just started compiling a new build. I didn’t empty the Tracking Usage Description as I thought it might not matter anymore, I’m wondering if I did it wrong… Let’s see what happens, whether I’m even able to submit the build for the review. Fingers crossed.

Also, let me add to this topic another important point to consider while I’m waiting for the build to finish and now that the team is looking into this matter. Namely, what if we do need to ask the user for the permission to track? Currently, I don’t see any way of displaying such a prompt with Thunkable. I ran into this issue a while ago as I was merely trying to show the user a web page through the web viewer and there was (on the page) a prompt asking for a cookie consent. For Apple reviewer this was already too much and they told me that I should use the tracking prompt to ask for the user’s permission to track. So we would need to have a way to display the tracking prompt.

I also started to wonder how I’d play it out if there were such a tracking prompt with Thunkable and the user said no to it – for example, it would not be easy to really communicate this to a web page in the web viewer in a dynamic way. But at least I could redirect the user to a new page / block using the web viewer altogether if such a prompt would function in Thunkable the same way alerts do. So if I were part of the team, I’d start by adding this prompt so that it would function (within Thunkable) essentially like any other alert.

By the way, I’d still very much like to be part of the Thunkable beta tester group if possible and if you see my input as helpful. Been using Thunkable for a few years now and been doing all sorts of things with this amazing platform. I voiced this wish already some time ago elsewhere and I was replied that this could be possible but I haven’t heard back from this since then.

Right, so now I tried to submit the app with the Tracking Usage Description not emptied and got the same error:

Unable to Submit for Review

The items below are required to start the review process:

  • Your app contains NSUserTrackingUsageDescription, indicating that it may request permission to track users. To submit for review, update your App Privacy response to indicate that data collected from this app will be used for tracking purposes, or update your app binary and upload a new build. Learn More

So next I’ll empty the field and build again and resubmit.

Edit:

Yeah, I was now able to submit the build after clearing the Tracking Usage Description. Really hoping this works. Apple reviewers are so meticulous that it’s not a given. I’ll keep you updated.

By the way, the forum informed me that it’s my Thunkable anniversary today. Yay me. :smiley:

2 Likes

I am in the same App Store, I rejected the application
El 8 dic. 2021 a las 12:08

De Apple

    1. 1 Performance: App Completeness
    1. 1.1 Legal: Privacy - Data Collection and Storage

Guideline 2.1 - Information Needed

We’re looking forward to completing our review, but we need more information to continue. Your app uses the AppTrackingTransparency framework, but we are unable to locate the App Tracking Transparency permission request when reviewed on iOS 15.1.

Next Steps

Please explain where we can find the App Tracking Transparency permission request in your app. The request should appear before any data is collected that could be used to track the user.

If you’ve implemented App Tracking Transparency but the permission request is not appearing on devices running the latest OS, please review the available documentation and confirm App Tracking Transparency has been correctly implemented.

Resources

Guideline 5.1.1 - Legal - Privacy - Data Collection and Storage

For anyone who has published since yesterday, if you can provide the rough time of publishing along with your timezone, that would be greatly helpful. There is a chance that the app was published before our fix went live on the server.

If you can provide this information it would be greatly helpful! Thanks in advance.

@Vaiper_watafai @ethosworkfi @towball @lamagalhaes @dlmetzgerbcch @carlinmclellan @wiselabr0x

if you haven’t published in the last 24 hours, we urge you to try it out now! It should be good to go.

Mine was uploaded to Apple 2013 h Pacific time, after the message I got to try to republish.

@dlmetzgerbcch Can you share the project url with me via dm?

Hi, I just saw you submitted another iOS publish when you posted this message. Is the Apple message from an old submission?

Thanks,
Wei

2 Likes

Hello I am trying to upload an application in the App Store but Apple throws me the message that I published, it is my second application in IOS. The first one that I published was without problems and now I cannot update it because it throws me other problems, in short I sent it again and I am waiting for confirmation, and my second application does not let me publish because it says this. App Tracking Transparency, I am not using any components, just airtable

https://x.thunkable.com/projects/6056410554e3dd0011f631f7/d488f262-dad7-4229-9873-e9b1ace8d6a9/designer