Will the End of Internet ‘Cookies’ Bring More User Privacy?

Google has announced plans to stop supporting tools designed to follow internet
users across the web in order to target them with specific advertising.
Such tools are known as cookies. These are small data files that are stored on an
internet user’s computer as they browse different websites. This data can be read
by web servers to identify web browsing behaviors of the user.
Cookies make it possible for users to avoid having to repeatedly enter their user
names and passwords to get access to websites they use often. But the use of
cookies raises major privacy concerns, with critics saying a user’s browsing history
should not be recorded just to target them with ads.
Google announced in 2020 it had decided “to remove support for third-party
cookies” from its Chrome browser. Chrome has a world market share of about 60
percent. Other browsers, such as Mozilla’s Firefox and Apple’s Safari, have
already blocked third-party cookies.
In another recent online announcement, Google repeated this promise and said it
will not build or use new tools to replace current cookie technology.
In explaining its decision, Google pointed to a Pew Research study that found 72
percent of Americans feel that almost all of what they do online or on a cellphone
is tracked by advertisers. Google’s decision to remove third-party cookies also
followed increasing efforts to protect privacy in Europe and the United States.
Google said the current internet advertising model needs to change to answer “the
growing concerns people have about their privacy and how their personal identity
is being used.” Otherwise, it added, “we risk the future of the free and open web.”
Questions raised on Google’s plan
In January, however, Google’s plan was called into question by British competition
regulators. The country’s Competition and Markets Authority announced it had
launched an investigation into whether the changes would give Google an unfair
advantage over competitors in internet advertising.
The agency said it received objections to the plan from Marketers for an Open
Web, a coalition of technology and publishing companies. The group accuses
Google of “abusing its dominant position” by attempting to create a new
advertising model.
In its latest statement, Google said it has been working with others in the industry
on the “Privacy Sandbox” project, which aims to create a new system to please
both advertisers and publishers. Google also repeated that it does not plan to
replace third-party cookies with new “user level identifiers.”
“We will not build alternate identifiers to track individuals as they browse across
the web, nor will we use them in our products,” the company said.
What Google is proposing is to group web users with similar interests together to
gather information for advertising purposes. Such a system would “hide
individuals within large [groups] of people” and prevent individual tracking, the
company said.
Businesses could, for example, target ads to a group of people who show interest in
buying a car, rather than using cookies that tracked individual users across
different car-buying websites.
James Rosewell heads Marketers for an Open Web. He told The Associated Press
that even though the changes are aimed at improving user privacy, Google will still
be able to track users of its own services.
“What they’re not saying is that ‘people are logged into our products all the time’”
and therefore are giving permission to be tracked when they use Search, Maps,
Gmail or YouTube, Rosewell said. “What they’re not saying is, ‘we’re going to
stop all of that’.”
I’m Bryan Lynn.
The Associated Press reported this story. Bryan Lynn adapted the report for
Learning English. Hai Do was the editor.