Rejoice! Safari Is Once Again Providing Google Referral Information In iOS

Since last September, people using Safari on iOS devices and searching on Google have appeared to publishers as if they came directly to their sites, not via Google. Now, the problem has ended, with iOS now apparently having been upgraded to support the “meta referrer” tag.

No, this doesn’t solve the “not provided” issue, where Google itself may strip search terms used to find a site from the referrer passed to publishers. However, at least people should now appear as if they came from Google Search generally, rather than as if they were “direct” visitors.

With iOS 7, Apple’s new iOS update expected to be released this fall, but currently in beta, Apple has begun to pass the referrer data to web sites from Google.

I’ve tested this using iOS 7 and iOS 6, on the iPad. Through iOS 6, the referrer data is not provided and hidden when you click from Google’s search results page to a web site. But with iOS 7, the referrer data is provided. Well, not all of it as discussed with the “not provided” issue but at least publishers and webmasters know the traffic is coming from Google and not from “direct sources.”

With iOS 7, the referrer data is passed virtually all the ways you search Google. Be it signed in or signed out, be it searching directly on Google.com or searching via the omni search box in mobile Safari.

When iOS 7 is released to the masses, expect major shifts in your analytics to account for the proper reporting of Google search traffic from iOS devices.

With iOS 6, we’re finding conflicting things. Some on the iPhone report full referrers being passed. Some get only a short Google.com referrer. Some get no referrer at all. And what you get can also vary depending on whether you search when signed-in, signed-out and via the Safari search box or from the Google.com home page.

Postscript: Two new stories with some more analysis came out from Adobe and Define Media Group.

Related Stories

• Mystery Solved: Why Mobile Safari Searchers Appear To Come “Direct” To Sites Rather Than Via Google
• The Death Of Web Analytics? An Ode To The Threatened Referrer
• How A Google Change May Mistakenly Turn Search Traffic Into Referral Traffic
• Google To Begin Encrypting Searches & Outbound Clicks By Default With SSL Search
• Google Puts A Price On Privacy
• 2011: The Year Google & Bing Took Away From SEOs & Publishers
• Firefox 14 Now Encrypts Google Searches, But Search Terms Still Will “Leak” Out
• How An iOS 6 Change Makes It Seem Like Google Traffic From Safari Has Disappeared
• Google’s (Not Provided) Impacting More Than Just SEO Sites
• How “Not Provided” May Make BuzzFeed Think Google’s Search Traffic To News Sites Is Down
• Dark Google: One Year Since Search Terms Went “Not Provided”
• Study: 39% Of Google Search Referrers Now “Not Provided”
• Will [Not Provided] Ever Reach 100% In Web Analytics?
• How To Turn (Not Provided) Into Useful, Actionable Data