Google Chrome to phase out support for third-party cookies

Google plans to phase out support for third-party cookies in Chrome, the company announced in a blog post Jan. 14. The company plans to do so within two years. “But we cannot get there alone, and that’s why we need the ecosystem to engage on these proposals. We plan to start the first origin trials by the end of this year, starting with conversion measurement and following with personalization” says the blog.

In August, Google announced a new initiative known as Privacy Sandbox to develop a set of open standards to enhance privacy on the web, the company says. The cookies announcement is an update on that initiative.

“Users are demanding greater privacy — including transparency, choice and control over how their data is used — and it’s clear the web ecosystem needs to evolve to meet these increasing demands” says the blog.

Google says it’s gotten positive feedback in forums like the W3C (World Wide Web Consortium) that the mechanisms underlying the Privacy Sandbox represent key use-cases and go in the right direction. 

Meanwhile, new research has found that cookies represent higher revenue to online publishers. According to the study, titled “Consumer Privacy Choice in Online Advertising: Who opts out and at what cost to industry?” there is a 52 percent reduction in advertising revenue to publishers when cookies are eliminated through user opt-out protocols. When cookies are present, publishers’ ad pricing doubles, the study says.

The study is authored by Garrett Johnson of Questrom School of Business at Boston University; Scott Shriver of the Leeds School of Business at the University of Colorado; and Shaoyin Du of the Simon Business School at the University of Rochester. It can be found in the January edition of the INFORMS journal “Marketing Science.”

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