Apple compromised on its principles by partnering with Taboola, a veritable fount of scammy and untrustworthy ads, and Apple's consumers are now having to contend with the result: a deluge of shoddy advertisements on Apple News.

The veteran tech journalist, Kirk McElhearn, has just penned an interesting post, titled " ."

For the benefit of those who might not be aware, , one of the largest ad-tech companies in the world, back in 2024. Under the terms of the deal, Taboola was to drive native advertisement within Apple News and Apple Stocks apps.

Since then, however, as per McElhearn's assessment, ads on Apple News have only gotten worse. Do note that unlike most subscription models, Apple does not remove ads if you subscribe to the Apple News+ tier . Even so, the subscription does remove paywalls from a lot of publications.

According to McElhearn, some of the ads are not only sloppily generated via AI, they are also downright scammy. For instance, an ad from Tidenox shows an AI-generated image of an elderly woman, replete with the Google Gemini logo at the bottom. The ad follows and offering steep discounts as an inventory-clearing pathway. The unlucky few who do order typically never receive their merchandise.

Many of the ads that McElhearn identifies got their domains registered only recently, some as soon as last month. This is another potent red flag.

Of course, this discourse boils down to a simple question: is Apple morally obligated to engage in at least a pretense of sifting through the ads on its platforms? We already know there is no such legal obligation. In the meantime, the gig continues.

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