UK "No Tracking Law" Now In Effect

Fluffeh writes "The British Gov might have more cameras up on street corners than just about anywhere else in the world, but it seems that the Gov doesn't want anyone else stepping on the privacy of their folks. In what the media have dubbed the 'Cookie Law' all operators of websites in Britain must notify users of the tracking that the website does. This doesn't only cover cookies, but all forms of tracking and analytics performed on visitors. While there are potential fines up up to 500,000 pounds (Over US$750,000) for websites not following these new rules, the BBC announced that very few websites are ready, even most of its own sites aren't up to speed — and amusingly even the governments own websites aren't ready."

Comments

WIll be very fun to see Gizmodo.co.uk warn...

[Anonymous Coward]

because atm, ghostery reports 10 diffrent tracking entities.

Harm Europe economically?

[Geeky]

All this will do is harm European companies at the expense of ones based elsewhere.

I've seen UK based sites start to implement this, but there's no chance that Facebook, Google etc will follow suit - so if the tracking actually does have monetary value, we've just guaranteed that only non-European companies can benefit from it. Woohoo.

Re:You maniacs! You blew it up!

[Anonymous Brave Guy]

People need to actively accept that you are tracking them. Just showing such text somewhere is not enough.

Actually, the ICO seems to have pulled a complete U-turn with 48 hours to go, and now says that implied consent can be enough.

Whether that will stand up to the seemingly inevitable legal challenge in the European courts remains to be seen, but I suspect even the ICO think this is a dumb law behind the scenes, and their language has been softening substantially in recent weeks relative to their early advice.