Google has once again pushed its plans to deprecate third-party tracking cookies in its Chrome web browser as it works to address outstanding competition concerns from U.K. regulators over its Privacy Sandbox initiative.
The tech giant said it’s working closely with the U.K. Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) and hopes to achieve an agreement by the end of the year.
While Google has since enabled the features to a subset of Chrome browser users as of last year, the U.K. watchdog, alongside the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), has been keeping a close eye on the implementation to ensure that Privacy Sandbox benefits consumers and doesn’t favor Google’s own advertising tech.
Both Apple and Mozilla have discontinued support for third-party cookies in their respective web browsers as of early 2020.
In a setback for Google, a draft report from the ICO revealed that the company’s proposed replacements have gaps that advertisers could exploit to identify users, effectively undermining the privacy and anonymity objectives, according to the Wall Street Journal last week.
The development comes as Google said it’s updating client-side encrypted (CSE) Google Meet calls to include support for inviting external participants, including those without a Google account.
Source: https://thehackernews.com/
