Enlarge / The Privacy Sandbox settings. (credit: Google)
Google is on a quest to kill the third-party web cookie, which is often used by advertisers to track users for targeted ads. Unlike other browser companies like Apple and Mozilla, which just block third-party cookies outright, Google will be one of the world’s largest advertising companies, so it doesn’t want to kill the third-party cookie without protecting its primary revenue source first. Google seems to view user tracking as a mandatory part of Internet usage, and instead of third-party cookies, it wants to build the user-tracking system directly into its Chrome browser. Google’s eye-roll-inducing name for this advertising system is the particular ” Privacy Sandbox , ” and today, the company is releasing its latest tracking solution in Chrome’s nightly “Canary” builds.
The latest Chromium Blog post lays out typically the current timeline, saying: “Starting today, developers can begin testing globally this Topics, FLEDGE, and Attribution Reporting APIs in the Canary version of Chrome. We’ll progress to a new limited number of Chrome Beta users as soon as possible. Once things are working smoothly in Beta, we’ll make API testing available in the stable version of Chrome to expand screening to more Chrome users. ”
Topics will have Chrome locally track your browsing history and build a list of interests, which Chrome will then share with advertisers whenever they ask for ad targeting. If you want a breakdown of the API name-checked in Google’s statement, often the FLEDGE API is responsible for both running an ad action directly on your device and picking an advertiser and then targeting users based on behavior, like leaving an item in a shopping cart. The Attribution Confirming API is in charge of measuring ad clicks, impressions, and tracking purchase conversions.
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