iOS 9 Aims To Replace Current App-To-App Linking Methods With A Privacy-Friendly One

Apple is hoping to lure developers away from the temptations of the URL scheme, which Twitter infamously made use of last year to track what apps are installed on your iOS device, To do that, they’ve introduced a new alternative in Universal Links, which can direct users right to the relevant content within your app, using just a standard web link preceded by either http:// or https://.

This alternate method has a few advantages, according to Apple, above and beyond the old way of doing things. First, it avoids the privacy issues. since use of the custom schemes doesn’t tell the originating app whether or not you have the destination app installed. It also means that links always open in the correct app, which isn’t true of URL schemes since any app can technically adopt them, resulting in conflict if more than one select the same.