Better way to access Safari website data on iOS?

Question

It is really irritating to have to one at a time delete hundreds of cookies/caches from websites I have never visited. (Would that Apple would allow us to block third-party cookies).

Is there an API that would allow me to build my own app in Xcode to handle it in a better way? Or something like Cookie 6 (macOS) for iOS? Or someone else’s open source that I can compile?

I’m not willing to jailbreak, nor to install something with source code not vetted by me or Apple.

For example, clearing all website data and then logging in to Facebook.com adds five third-party cookies. Three of them are from domains owned by Facebook, but do not end in Facebook.com. The other two are obviously from advertising services.

This is why I use DuckDuckGo for almost everything, and Safari only occasionally. DuckDuckGo lets me clear everything after a session. I use Safari for a few domains where I’d like to keep their cookies only, but the cost of that is consumption of storage space that doesn’t benefit me and prevents syncing all the music I’d like.

The cookies are less irritating than the consumption of limited storage space. But if third-party cookies are accepted, cross-site tracking is implied. Since I cleared all website data (recently), I have not visited any site with “math” in the name. Only Facebook, UniGen.us, and three SE subdomains. Yet I have a cookie from mathoverflow.com And Safari says it’s size is zero bytes. Obviously, it is at least one byte. But more of an issue are the megabytes of third-party local storage resulting in updates and Music syncs failing for insufficient space.

Answer 1

Safari already blocks third-party cookies by default. Check yours is in Settings → Safari → Prevent Cross-Site Tracking.

There are no APIs for interacting with data from the Safari app, only for web views within the app itself. Therefore there’s nothing third party apps can do without jailbreaking.

Answer 2

Yes, as a user it is very infuriating that Apple does not allow other browsers on ios / iPadOS with better privacy features (all browsers on ios have to use Safari's Webkit rendering engine, and thus all of them suffer from similar limitations).

To better safeguard your privacy on ios / iPadOS, I recommend the following -

1. Disable Safari on iCloud.

2. Install AdGuard and,

3. Enable Private Browsing on Safari.

Pros of this approach:

1. Adguard is designed to blocks ads and trackers on Safari in an Apple approved safe manner.

2. Since most of the ad and tracker scripts are blocked, websites load faster. And when they are blocked, they can't install their unwanted cookies too.

3. By using Private Browsing mode on Safari, you ensure that whenever you close Safari, or any Tab on Safari, all website data (including cookies) is deleted immediately.

4. Preventing Safari from syncing to iCloud prevents previous (or other device) Safari website data from being loaded into Safari on your ios, from iCloud.

Cons:

1. On rare occasions, some websites don't work properly when ads and / or trackers are blocked. This is rare, but Safari provides an easy fix - it has an option to reload the website again without any content blocking.

2. In Private Browsing mode, no history or auto-fill information is saved. Moreover, since it deletes all websites data, you cannot be always logged in.

3. Some ad networks hate Private browsing mode. Websites that use them will thus sometimes show banners / pop-ups blocking the site partially. Adguard takes care of most of these annoyances, but some still slip through. (I have noticed this mostly on large online media sites).

I find this approach as a good compromise on convenience vs privacy on the ios platform.

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If you want build and customise your own browser for ios, Firefox Focus is a decent open source browser you can use for your project - source code for Firefox Focus for iOS is available on Github.