If a lack of privacy is like being nude in public, Apple is an expensive bouncer at an expensive club where you take your clothes off for free in front of people who pay apple a cover charge, because Apple promised them you have the biggest tits.
I don't think u need to worry to much about ur browser when ur os is always sending info in the background.
What info? god knows, but its concerning how it increased after apple introduced his plan to do some shady Facebook like business just after u guessed, blocking Facebook for doing the same without giving him his part of the cake.
Do you have proof of this? For example with the payment info on Apple Pay. It is all encrypted, not even the side I’m buying from sees my address or credit card info.
IMO much better. It’s Apple product. You give your data to them anyway while using macOS or iOS so that’s one argument: no need to share your data with anyone else.
Apart of that they have built in tracking blockers and I think they fiddle with cookies because I get logged out from services more frequently than on other browsers that I use for web development.