Privacy campaigns have called the new Google rules to track people online “gross disregard for consumer confidentiality”.
The changes that enter Sundays allow the so -called “prints”, which allows online advertisers to collect more data for users, including their IP addresses and information about their devices.
Google says this data is already widely used by other companies and continue to promote the use of responsible data.
However, the company has previously come out strongly against this type of data collection, saying In a blog for 2019 These fingerprints “undermine the user's choice and is wrong”.
But in a Post The announcement of the new rule is changing, Google said that the way people used the Internet – as devices such as Smart TV and consoles – means it is more difficult to target ads to users using conventional data collection that Users control with the consent of cookies.
In addition, it is said that more privacy options provide users safety.
Google told the BBC in a statement: “Privacy technologies offer new ways to our partners to succeed in new platforms … without compromising consumer confidentiality.”
But opponents of the change say that the fingerprint print and the collection of IP addresses are a stroke for confidentiality, as it is more difficult for users to control what data is being collected for them.
“By allowing fingerprints, Google has given itself – and the advertising industry that dominates – permission to use a tracking form that people can't do much to stop,” says Martin Thomson, an excellent Mozilla engineer, a rival to Google.
The fingerprint fingerprint collects information about the device and browser of a person and puts it together to create a profile of that person.
The information is not explicitly collected to advertise people, but can be used to target specific ads based on this user's data.
For example, the screen size or language settings of a person are legally needed to display a website correctly.
But when this is combined with their time zone, the browser type, battery level – and many other data points – can create a unique combination of settings, which facilitates the development of who uses a web service.
These details, along with someone's IP address – the unique identifier used by Internet devices – were previously banned by Google for targeting ads.
Privacy campaigns say that, unlike cookies, which are small files stored on a local device, users have little control of sending information on prints to advertiser prints.
“Explicitly allowing a tracking technique, which they earlier defined as incompatible with consumer control, Google emphasizes his constant prioritization of profits over confidentiality,” says Lena Cohen, an Electronic Frontier Foundation.
“The same tracking techniques that Google claims to be essential to online advertising also expose the sensitive information to people to data brokers, surveillance and law enforcement companies,” she added.
“My argument would be that the fingerprint print is sitting in a small gray area,” says Pete Wallace of the Gumgum advertising technology company.
“Do people have to feel comfortable to stay in a gray area of privacy? I would say no,” he adds.
Gumgum, which has previously worked with BBC for advertising campaigns, relies on something called contextual advertising that uses other data points to direct ads to online users, such as keywords on the website they are, not their personal data.
G -n Wallace says that the resolution of prints is a change in the industry.
“The fingerprint print feels that it uses a much more business-oriented approach to using consumer data rather than consumer-oriented approach,” he says.
“This type of flip-flop is detrimental that the industry seems to be focused on this idea to really put the confidentiality of users in the foreground.”
He adds that he hopes advertising technology companies will conclude that “this is not the right way to use user data”, but they expect them to view the fingerprint print as an option to focus better on ads.
Advertising is the vital force of the Internet business model and allows many websites to be freely available to users without having to pay directly to access them.
But in return, users often have to give up private information about themselves so that advertisers can show them the right ads.
The United Kingdom of the United Kingdom, the Information Commissioner Service (ICO), says “fingerprint print is not a fair means of tracking online online as it is likely to reduce people's choice and control how their information is collected “.
In a Blog post In December, ICO CEO for regulatory risk Stephen Almond wrote: “We believe this change is irresponsible.”
He added that advertisers and businesses that decide to use this technology will have to demonstrate how they remain within the Laws of Data and Privacy in the UK.
“Based on our understanding of how print techniques are currently used for advertising, it's a high meeting bar,” he writes.
Google said in a statement: “We are looking forward to a major discussion with ICO about this change in policy.
“We know that data signals like IP addresses are already used by others in the industry today, and Google has been using IP responsibly to combat fraud for years.”
A spokesman added: “We continue to choose consumers whether to receive personalized ads and we will work throughout the industry to encourage the use of data responsible.”