You might see that the Dropbox Community team have been busy working on some major updates to the Community itself! So, here is some info on what’s changed, what’s staying the same and what you can expect from the Dropbox Community overall.
Forum Discussion
Dropbox API and Apples App privacy details on the App Store
Apple requires to provide app privacy details (see https://developer.apple.com/app-store/app-privacy-details/ ) While an iOS app uses dropbox to store/read a user's data, it can provide the detai...
The team has written up guidance on this for the SDKs, which you can find at the following links:
Greg-DB
Dropbox Staff
Dropbox StaffWe don't have documentation specifically for the official Dropbox iOS SDKs in particular with regard to the new Apple privacy detail requirements, but you can find Dropbox's privacy information in general here:
https://help.dropbox.com/accounts-billing/security/privacy-policy-faq
The official Dropbox SDKs don't do anything other than process API calls and app authorization flows but I'll ask the team write up some documentation for this specifically. The official Dropbox iOS SDKs are open source so they can be inspected if desired though:
Greg-DB Thanks for the reply and outlook. It would be great to get some advise on this. I am also not sure, if there is a difference in the privacy notes, if the iOS app showing the authentication dialog as part of the app (as e.g. the objc SDK does if the Dropbox App is not installed) or if it uses external Safari redirection.
- Greg-DB
Thanks for following up. This is open with the team as a request for detailed documentation for this for the SDKs in particular. I'll follow up here with any updates on that.
Thank you for addressing this. It's not only the SDKs themselves that matter here, but also what the servers do with that data. I'm sure that not only we, but all other App Store devs would appreciate it if you can provide an authoritative set of answers for Apple's data collection and tracking questions for apps that use a Dropbox SDK. This would obviously be limited to just the Dropbox interface part and may have to be extended for each individual app, but it would be a valuable baseline to start from.
Your link to Dropbox' general privacy policy is but a tiny step in that direction. This is basically telling tens of thousands of devs to all perform the same arduous task, filtering and interpreting the pages upon pages of legalese in your privacy policy into Apple's categories and terms, where your legal team could do that just once in an authoritative manner. It is also impossible for devs to discern if all the generic collection and tracking provisions detailed in the privacy policy even apply for SDK interfacing, or only when Dropbox' website or own app is being used.
At face value, it would seem that any app would have to declare the privacy provisions of the Dropbox official app as a bare minimum, which includes user tracking and other sensitive topics. That's a tough proposition for apps that strive to present themselves as respecting user privacy in the best possible way.
About Dropbox API Support & Feedback
Find help with the Dropbox API from other developers.
