The Pros and Cons of the end of tracking cookies
Google had planned to restrict third-party tracking cookies but has delayed the implementation date until the end of 2024, the second extension of Chrome’s third-party cookies support, which Google had planned to cease to do in 2022. The Privacy Sandbox is intended to enhance individual privacy while giving businesses the resources they require to be successful online.
“The most consistent feedback we’ve received is the need for more time to evaluate and test the new Privacy Sandbox technologies before deprecating third-party cookies in Chrome…This deliberate approach to transitioning from third-party cookies ensures that the web can continue to thrive, without relying on cross-site tracking identifiers or covert techniques like fingerprinting.”- Anthony Chavez, Vice President of Google’s Privacy Sandbox initiative
While users can block their IP address in Apple’s iOS 15 upgrade, thus stopping tracking from protecting privacy. Earlier, Mozilla’s Firefox and Apple’s Safari browser had already disabled third-party cookies.
However, how should users and marketers enter the post-Cookie era? What exactly are the pros and cons of blocking third-party cookies?
Cookies were originally an effective method to track one’s online behavior, but as technology has advanced, concerns about privacy and tracking capabilities have surfaced.
Pros for user
- Protect privacy
- Eliminates statefulness in cookie blocking
- Make cross-site disclosure of user information no longer feasible
For example, if a user visits a website, the website writes the user’s information to some cookies under the domain name of that website; however, the console contains cookies under other domains that are third-party cookies. Although the user may have never visited these domains, it has been quietly identified by these third-party cookies to share the user’s personal information. Therefore, disabling third-party cookies can be a good way to help stop user information leakage.
Cons for user
- Inconvenience (e.g. cannot re-filled address information on order forms)
- Cannot be personalized (e.g. cannot see anything of interest or relevance)
One crucial function of these browser cookies is to display relevant adverts. If the advertisements are irrelevant to the customer’s requirements, wants, or desires, neither the company nor the consumer benefit. The company’s money and a potential customer’s time are wasted.
Pros for marketers
- Developing and optimizing new digital technologies for the consumer experience
Cons for marketers
- Inability to target advertising
- Loss of profitability
- Advertising can not form a high conversion rate
The digital marketing sector uses third-party cookies in browsers to compile user IDs and browsing histories. Google’s move is undoubtedly bad news for businesses in this industry. Online advertising and marketing organizations have been tracking and identifying Internet users on various websites using cookies, mostly third-party cookies. Advertisers can focus their ads and manage their frequency based on users’ web surfing histories across numerous websites. The conversion of ad browsing exposure and clicks is also used to calculate data on the effectiveness of advertising campaigns.
However, is blocking third-party cookies sufficient to safeguard user privacy?
Not necessarily.
Google relies on huge amounts of advertising, and the motivation to do the restriction is after the penalty. Still, I don’t think the Internet can completely solve the problem of the privacy breach. On the other hand, Google’s privacy policy prohibits third-party cookies, but first-party cookies, including those on Google’s own Gmail, Youtube, and Chrome, are not restricted. However, the internet advertising industry’s standards will change due to the removal of third-party cookies, impacting all the brands, services, and products offered by the online marketing industry and technological networks. Moreover, the amount of data accessible to third parties will decrease significantly, while the tech giant will be able to create a closed ecological loop using first-party data. The digital marketing industry’s running costs will increase as a result, and in the long run, this might create a closed information loop that could result in the risk of data and information breaches.
