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Google Adds To Mozilla's Push For 'Do Not Track'
AndyAndyAndyAndy writes "In a morning blog post, Google announced the release of a Chrome plug-in called 'Keep My Opt-Outs,' which hopes to block all tracking cookies. Interestingly, it is released as open-source with the hopes that it will gain quick deployment on non-Chrome browsers and find a robust foothold against ads. The story is also covered at Computerworld, which has broader insight into the issue, looking at Google, Mozilla and Firefox, and seems to indicate more rapid change is looming — potentially from the FCC itself."
... I love cookies!
Cookie cookie cookie!
NOM NOM NOM!
Why don't we just skip to the part where everyone has enabled this feature.
who pioneered use of the first persistent cookie (set to expire in 2038, I believe?)
Is this just another part of the battle with Adobe, who owns Omniture and competes with Google Analytics?
Just because I can hook a shark from a boat, I do no offer to wrestle it in the water.
Does this plug-in/add-on also stop all tracking of Google properties?
Not just the google ads, but also all those other google sites like oh, I don't know, googleapis, youtube etc?
Just because they're not serving ads doesn't mean that they don't or can't track you.
So does Anonymous Coward have good karma?
So, Google, a company that makes its money selling ad space, is distributing software to help block advertising? That seems either incredibly counter-intuitive, or incredibly cynical ("no one will use it except people who know how to do it anyway, so why not get some good press"). It'll be interesting to see which it really is, but I'm going to have to lean towards cynical on this one for the time being (call me cynical...).
You think your cookies and tracking are harmless, or even good, but as you can see, very powerful backlashes form which will hurt everyone because you abused your privelege, and cross-site cookies tracking is a privelege. I understand the need for advertising tracking to improve the value of the ad to the ad buyer and to me, the ad "consumer". But considering it's becoming a hodge-podge and used to make people very uncomfortable, there was an inevitible push back.
You lost the Javascript/flash wars because you allowed abusive banner ads. Sure, you got a quick hit for a year or two, but for how long until AdBlocker has become de rigeur for the heavy Internet browser? So by trying to be too flashy and too in your face, you lost all right to use Javascript/flash for your ads.
Now you are losing the cookie battle too.
Just try not to be evil and respect people's wishes. Is it really that hard? Really?
The bitter lessons of a veteran coder: http://bitterprogrammer.blogspot.com
If I were google, I'd be pretty psyched to be the only ad provider who can triangulate from search to ad delivery. Thats a real coup in terms of unique analytics for them. Between every page that has their ads on it, every site that uses their site analytics and every request that has google.com as the launch point (and access to http-referer information across all of these....it'd be hard to imagine an analytics company coming close to competing.
There are many more desserts than just cookies.
They are not on the same page. Blocking cookies is pointless. Robust all-knowing behavior tracking occurs on the server side. By implementing a header flag, Mozilla is ahead of the game. That flag covers any kind of tracking currently used or to be deployed in the future by asserting a generic end-user request always and uniformly. Blocking cookies addresses an obsolete tracking mechanism.
It's also in Google's interests to implement weak voluntary controls rather than FTC-mandated strict controls that would more-directly impinge on Google's bottom line.
An FTC ruling which dictates something along the lines of "You must default everybody to opted-out of all advertisements, and allow them to opt back in if they wish to," pretty much destroys Google's business overnight. "No need for the FTC to take action, since the browser makers have already provided a system to allow users to opt out of advertisements if they wish to," hurts a lot less.
>> Blocking cookies addresses an obsolete tracking mechanism.
So that's why I don't see any cookie on my system at all!!??!?
I think it's a good idea in general, to provide the option to not be tracked. Q: "Why are we doing this?" A: "We recognize that some users are uncomfortable with the personalization of ads that they see on the web."
I don't mind personalized ads. Just yesterday I was looking at Banquet Homestyle Meals, and about an hour later, slashdot sent me a personalized ad to the same thing, on sale, at Meijers. It was one of those rare cases where I was glad to see the advertisement, since it was showing me what I was looking for.
FREE magazine : http://clarkesworldmagazine.com/prior/
Link for Netscape and Mozilla SeaMonkey users:
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/seamonkey/addon/ghostery/
FREE magazine : http://clarkesworldmagazine.com/prior/
That isn't a reasonable solution. For one thing they're still able to track you within that day, and for another it can be challenging to figure out which cookie you've blocked is causing problems with the current page and why it's needed.
What we really need is something in place to require companies to have permission before they set a cookie, a statement about the use and a ban on them trying to cram it on the end user.
Didn't they undergo a massive cave-in to special interests?
We can argue all day about that, but it doesn't really matter since the organization that is putting on pressure for do-not-track mechanisms is the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), not the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) that recently adopted open internet ("net neutrality") rules that have been panned by some neutrality advocates as "worse than nothing" in terms of restricting ISP abuses and by some ISPs and Tea Party types as a totalitarian takeover of the internet by government.
Not true. The big behavior trackers no longer rely on cookies and haven't for some time.
I don't think you understand how the extension works. Its not a cookie blocker, its a cookie store that doesn't get erased when you erase your cookies -- specifically, it stores cookies for the cookie-based opt-out system that the big behavioral advertising providers are using.
One problem with this system without an extension like this is that clearing your cookies will clear your opt-outs. This system preserves the opt-out cookies (and ads them for new trackers as they become part of the system) so that you have a durable opt-out.
The actual method used for the behavioral tracking is irrelevant to the extension, what does matter is the method supported for opting out of the tracking.
"Your browser fingerprint appears to be unique among the 1,379,292 tested so far. Currently, we estimate that your browser has a fingerprint that conveys at least 20.4 bits of identifying information." -Panopticlick
I'm thinking opt-out of tracking by cookies, etc., is a throwaway. Google et al no longer need those technologies.
Cookies aren't obsolete because they're persistent within the browser despite a changing IP address. A login cookie on your laptop will still work when you bring it into the coffee shop. So will tracking cookies.