Google Chrome Privacy Sandbox open to all: Now websites can tap into your habits directly for ads
(2023/09/07)
- Reference: 1694120887
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2023/09/07/google_privacy_sandbox/
- Source link:
Google's Privacy Sandbox is now open for business, the search advertising behemoth said today.
Specifically, the web giant's Privacy Sandbox APIs, a set of ad delivery and analysis technologies, now function in the latest version of the Chrome browser. Website developers can thus write code that calls those APIs to deliver and measure ads to visitors with compatible browsers.
That is to say, sites can ask Chrome directly what kinds of topics you're interested in – topics automatically selected by Chrome from your browsing history – so that ads personalized to your activities can be served. This is supposed to be better than being tracked via third-party cookies, support for which is being phased out. There are other aspects to the sandbox that we'll get to.
[1]
While Chrome is the main vehicle for Privacy Sandbox code, Microsoft Edge, based on the open source Chromium project, has also shown signs of [2]supporting the technology . [3]Apple and [4]Mozilla have rejected at least the Topics API for interest-based ads on privacy grounds.
[5]
[6]
"Today, we mark a major milestone for the Privacy Sandbox for the Web, reaching 'general availability' on Chrome for the [7]relevance and measurement APIs ," said Anthony Chavez, VP of Google's Privacy Sandbox initiative, in an [8]announcement . "This milestone is a significant step on the path towards a fundamentally more private web."
Google's definition of privacy is not the dictionary definition most might understand. Rather it's the ad industry and legal definition where privacy is not so much a binary state – public or private – but a notionally consent-based trade of information to gain access to ad-supported content.
[9]Google asks websites to kindly not break its shiny new targeted-advertising API
[10]Google Chrome pushes ahead with targeted ads based on your browser history
[11]Google opens up Chrome 117 Developer Tools box, drops in a few spanners
[12]Google's next big idea for browser security looks like another freedom grab to some
What Google calls a "more private web" – or less intrusive web – aims to be better, at least, than the personal data free-for-all made possible by web cookies.
"Third-party cookies and other identifiers make it possible to track your activity across sites and apps, and your data can be shared more widely than you would like," the biz explained in a video accompanying its announcement.
[13]
"The Privacy Sandbox technologies will offer sites and apps alternative ways to show you personalized ads while keeping your personal information more private and minimizing how much data is collected about you."
These APIs include:
[14]Topics : Locally track browsing history to generate ads based on demonstrated user interests without third-party cookies or identifiers that can track across websites.
[15]Protected Audience (FLEDGE): Serve ads for [16]remarketing (e.g. you visited a shoe website so we'll show you a shoe ad elsewhere) while mitigating third-party tracking across websites.
[17]Attribution Reporting : Data to link ad clicks or ad views to conversion events (e.g. sales).
[18]Private Aggregation : Generate aggregate data reports using data from Protected Audience and cross-site data from Shared Storage.
[19]Shared Storage : Allow unlimited, cross-site storage write access with privacy-preserving read access. In other words, you graciously provide local storage via Chrome for ad-related data or anti-abuse code.
[20]Fenced Frames : Securely embed content onto a page without sharing cross-site data. Or iframes without the security and privacy risks.
These technologies, Google and industry allies believe, will allow the super-corporation to drop support for third-party cookies in Chrome next year without seeing a drop in targeted advertising revenue.
"The future of commerce media hinges on scalable, open-source solutions that respect consumer expectations, and today’s milestone gives Criteo and other industry players a valuable opportunity to ramp up testing efforts and gain deeper insight into the utility of the Privacy Sandbox APIs," said Todd Parsons, chief product officer at ad biz Criteo, in a supportive statement solicited by Google.
Coincidentally, Chrome turns 15 years old this month and Google has [21]announced some changes.
The desktop version will get a makeover with the biz's [22]Material You design theme, and the Chrome Web Store, now with [23]better browser extension security checking , has gotten [24]similar treatment . Along similar lines, [25]Google Safe Browsing has been upgraded to run in real-time, to better reflect that many phishing sites exist for only a few minutes before being dismantled to avoid detection.
Nor everyone in the ad industry is so sanguine about the transition, however. Marketing advocacy group [26]Movement for an Open Web , which has opposed the third-party cookie phaseout as a power grab, challenged the Privacy Sandbox project when API availability was initially teased in May.
"Privacy Sandbox removes the ability of website owners, agencies and marketers to target and measure their campaigns using their own combination of technologies in favor of a Google-provided solution," James Rosewell, co-founder of MOW, [27]told The Register at the time.
"No one would accept all food retailers closing the home baking aisle and forcing everyone to buy their own brand bread. Why would anyone accept Google and Apple’s identical behavior in digital markets?"
[28]
Google has been preparing the Chrome-using public for this transition over the past few months with [29]a popup notification announcing new privacy controls tailored to the new ad tech.
Controversially, in the US, where lack of coherent privacy rules suit ad companies just fine, the popup merely informs the user that these APIs are now present and active in the browser but requires visiting Chrome's Settings page to actually manage them – you have to opt-out, if you haven't already. In the EU, as required by law, the notification is an invitation to opt-in to interest-based ads via Topics. ®
Get our [30]Tech Resources
[1] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/personaltech&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2ZPpIAqjwH@vj9SQDbkPIfQAAAdU&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[2] https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/discussions/some-parts-of-the-privacy-sandbox-land-on-edge-canary/m-p/2019054
[3] https://github.com/WebKit/standards-positions/issues/111#issuecomment-1359609317
[4] https://github.com/mozilla/standards-positions/issues/622
[5] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/personaltech&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44ZPpIAqjwH@vj9SQDbkPIfQAAAdU&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[6] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/personaltech&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33ZPpIAqjwH@vj9SQDbkPIfQAAAdU&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[7] https://developer.chrome.com/en/blog/shipping-privacy-sandbox/#whats-shipping
[8] https://privacysandbox.com/intl/en_us/news/privacy-sandbox-for-the-web-reaches-general-availability
[9] https://www.theregister.com/2023/06/27/google_tweaks_topics_api_ahead/
[10] https://www.theregister.com/2023/09/06/google_privacy_popup_chrome/
[11] https://www.theregister.com/2023/08/17/chrome_117_developer_tools/
[12] https://www.theregister.com/2023/07/25/google_web_environment_integrity/
[13] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/personaltech&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44ZPpIAqjwH@vj9SQDbkPIfQAAAdU&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[14] https://developer.chrome.com/docs/privacy-sandbox/topics/
[15] https://developer.chrome.com/docs/privacy-sandbox/fledge/
[16] https://support.google.com/google-ads/answer/3124536?hl=en
[17] https://developer.chrome.com/docs/privacy-sandbox/attribution-reporting/
[18] https://developer.chrome.com/docs/privacy-sandbox/private-aggregation/
[19] https://developer.chrome.com/docs/privacy-sandbox/shared-storage/
[20] https://developer.chrome.com/docs/privacy-sandbox/fenced-frame/
[21] https://blog.google/products/chrome/google-chrome-new-features-redesign-2023/
[22] https://material.io/blog/announcing-material-you
[23] https://developer.chrome.com/en/blog/extension-safety-hub/
[24] https://chromewebstore.google.com/
[25] https://safebrowsing.google.com/
[26] https://movementforanopenweb.com/
[27] https://www.theregister.com/2023/05/20/google_privacy_sandbox_july/
[28] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/personaltech&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33ZPpIAqjwH@vj9SQDbkPIfQAAAdU&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[29] https://www.theregister.com/2023/09/06/google_privacy_popup_chrome/
[30] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
Specifically, the web giant's Privacy Sandbox APIs, a set of ad delivery and analysis technologies, now function in the latest version of the Chrome browser. Website developers can thus write code that calls those APIs to deliver and measure ads to visitors with compatible browsers.
That is to say, sites can ask Chrome directly what kinds of topics you're interested in – topics automatically selected by Chrome from your browsing history – so that ads personalized to your activities can be served. This is supposed to be better than being tracked via third-party cookies, support for which is being phased out. There are other aspects to the sandbox that we'll get to.
[1]
While Chrome is the main vehicle for Privacy Sandbox code, Microsoft Edge, based on the open source Chromium project, has also shown signs of [2]supporting the technology . [3]Apple and [4]Mozilla have rejected at least the Topics API for interest-based ads on privacy grounds.
[5]
[6]
"Today, we mark a major milestone for the Privacy Sandbox for the Web, reaching 'general availability' on Chrome for the [7]relevance and measurement APIs ," said Anthony Chavez, VP of Google's Privacy Sandbox initiative, in an [8]announcement . "This milestone is a significant step on the path towards a fundamentally more private web."
Google's definition of privacy is not the dictionary definition most might understand. Rather it's the ad industry and legal definition where privacy is not so much a binary state – public or private – but a notionally consent-based trade of information to gain access to ad-supported content.
[9]Google asks websites to kindly not break its shiny new targeted-advertising API
[10]Google Chrome pushes ahead with targeted ads based on your browser history
[11]Google opens up Chrome 117 Developer Tools box, drops in a few spanners
[12]Google's next big idea for browser security looks like another freedom grab to some
What Google calls a "more private web" – or less intrusive web – aims to be better, at least, than the personal data free-for-all made possible by web cookies.
"Third-party cookies and other identifiers make it possible to track your activity across sites and apps, and your data can be shared more widely than you would like," the biz explained in a video accompanying its announcement.
[13]
"The Privacy Sandbox technologies will offer sites and apps alternative ways to show you personalized ads while keeping your personal information more private and minimizing how much data is collected about you."
These APIs include:
[14]Topics : Locally track browsing history to generate ads based on demonstrated user interests without third-party cookies or identifiers that can track across websites.
[15]Protected Audience (FLEDGE): Serve ads for [16]remarketing (e.g. you visited a shoe website so we'll show you a shoe ad elsewhere) while mitigating third-party tracking across websites.
[17]Attribution Reporting : Data to link ad clicks or ad views to conversion events (e.g. sales).
[18]Private Aggregation : Generate aggregate data reports using data from Protected Audience and cross-site data from Shared Storage.
[19]Shared Storage : Allow unlimited, cross-site storage write access with privacy-preserving read access. In other words, you graciously provide local storage via Chrome for ad-related data or anti-abuse code.
[20]Fenced Frames : Securely embed content onto a page without sharing cross-site data. Or iframes without the security and privacy risks.
These technologies, Google and industry allies believe, will allow the super-corporation to drop support for third-party cookies in Chrome next year without seeing a drop in targeted advertising revenue.
"The future of commerce media hinges on scalable, open-source solutions that respect consumer expectations, and today’s milestone gives Criteo and other industry players a valuable opportunity to ramp up testing efforts and gain deeper insight into the utility of the Privacy Sandbox APIs," said Todd Parsons, chief product officer at ad biz Criteo, in a supportive statement solicited by Google.
Coincidentally, Chrome turns 15 years old this month and Google has [21]announced some changes.
The desktop version will get a makeover with the biz's [22]Material You design theme, and the Chrome Web Store, now with [23]better browser extension security checking , has gotten [24]similar treatment . Along similar lines, [25]Google Safe Browsing has been upgraded to run in real-time, to better reflect that many phishing sites exist for only a few minutes before being dismantled to avoid detection.
Nor everyone in the ad industry is so sanguine about the transition, however. Marketing advocacy group [26]Movement for an Open Web , which has opposed the third-party cookie phaseout as a power grab, challenged the Privacy Sandbox project when API availability was initially teased in May.
"Privacy Sandbox removes the ability of website owners, agencies and marketers to target and measure their campaigns using their own combination of technologies in favor of a Google-provided solution," James Rosewell, co-founder of MOW, [27]told The Register at the time.
"No one would accept all food retailers closing the home baking aisle and forcing everyone to buy their own brand bread. Why would anyone accept Google and Apple’s identical behavior in digital markets?"
[28]
Google has been preparing the Chrome-using public for this transition over the past few months with [29]a popup notification announcing new privacy controls tailored to the new ad tech.
Controversially, in the US, where lack of coherent privacy rules suit ad companies just fine, the popup merely informs the user that these APIs are now present and active in the browser but requires visiting Chrome's Settings page to actually manage them – you have to opt-out, if you haven't already. In the EU, as required by law, the notification is an invitation to opt-in to interest-based ads via Topics. ®
Get our [30]Tech Resources
[1] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/personaltech&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2ZPpIAqjwH@vj9SQDbkPIfQAAAdU&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[2] https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/discussions/some-parts-of-the-privacy-sandbox-land-on-edge-canary/m-p/2019054
[3] https://github.com/WebKit/standards-positions/issues/111#issuecomment-1359609317
[4] https://github.com/mozilla/standards-positions/issues/622
[5] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/personaltech&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44ZPpIAqjwH@vj9SQDbkPIfQAAAdU&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[6] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/personaltech&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33ZPpIAqjwH@vj9SQDbkPIfQAAAdU&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[7] https://developer.chrome.com/en/blog/shipping-privacy-sandbox/#whats-shipping
[8] https://privacysandbox.com/intl/en_us/news/privacy-sandbox-for-the-web-reaches-general-availability
[9] https://www.theregister.com/2023/06/27/google_tweaks_topics_api_ahead/
[10] https://www.theregister.com/2023/09/06/google_privacy_popup_chrome/
[11] https://www.theregister.com/2023/08/17/chrome_117_developer_tools/
[12] https://www.theregister.com/2023/07/25/google_web_environment_integrity/
[13] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/personaltech&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44ZPpIAqjwH@vj9SQDbkPIfQAAAdU&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[14] https://developer.chrome.com/docs/privacy-sandbox/topics/
[15] https://developer.chrome.com/docs/privacy-sandbox/fledge/
[16] https://support.google.com/google-ads/answer/3124536?hl=en
[17] https://developer.chrome.com/docs/privacy-sandbox/attribution-reporting/
[18] https://developer.chrome.com/docs/privacy-sandbox/private-aggregation/
[19] https://developer.chrome.com/docs/privacy-sandbox/shared-storage/
[20] https://developer.chrome.com/docs/privacy-sandbox/fenced-frame/
[21] https://blog.google/products/chrome/google-chrome-new-features-redesign-2023/
[22] https://material.io/blog/announcing-material-you
[23] https://developer.chrome.com/en/blog/extension-safety-hub/
[24] https://chromewebstore.google.com/
[25] https://safebrowsing.google.com/
[26] https://movementforanopenweb.com/
[27] https://www.theregister.com/2023/05/20/google_privacy_sandbox_july/
[28] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/personaltech&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33ZPpIAqjwH@vj9SQDbkPIfQAAAdU&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[29] https://www.theregister.com/2023/09/06/google_privacy_popup_chrome/
[30] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
karlkarl
The trick is to use your firewall to block Chrome from accessing the internet entirely ;)
Aleph0
Some days I feel pretty smug about never having dropped Firefox as my personal browser...
I'd rather the apps on my devices work on my behalf and not for the sake of advertising companies, thankyouverymuch.
Worry less.
Tron
Targeted advertising has never been much kop. The simple stuff (other people who bought this also bought these) works well enough, but the 'AI' stuff is bollocks (and definitely not worth paying for). I endlessly get offered things that I have bought (and don't need again) or similar products that I didn't buy for a reason. In some collecting areas it can be rarely useful, but there is no understanding or contextualisation, so 99.9% of the time, it is entirely useless. Weirdly, ebay seems to be unable to cope with pound signs in searches. I also have an ebay search logged for a particular type of stamp, but it delivers the same, completely irrelevant stuff each time: postcards of a mid-20thC politician I've never heard of. There is no match-up in any of the keywords. No idea how it is doing that. Perhaps an example of AI 'hallucinating'.
TL;DR: Ad targeting, outside dictatorships, is benign. Take the tin foil hats off, folks. 'Nothing' is a small price to pay for useful tech. We are getting the best deal of all here. Better than those paying for it.
Rabbit nozzles
Gene Cash
For some reason, I've started getting copious Amazon recommendations for rabbit nozzles.
I don't have the slightest idea what they are. I hazard a guess at some sort of feeding tubes, but looking at them, I'm at a loss how that would work.
I so love targeted advertising.
Sneaky
I have chorme on my system although I don't actually use it unless I find a particularly picky website which does not support my browser(s) of choice. Hoever, reading the article prompted me to fire it up with a view to updating and looking to see what sort of privacy options it would provide.
Chrome started with a message to say it could not be upgraded but I could reinstall with the latest version. When I said yes a download page popped up with a pre-checked option
"Help make Google Chrome better by automatically sending usage statistics and crash reports to Google. Learn more"
in a font so small I had to almost put my nose on the page to read it.
Chrome is now deleted.