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| Google says it i s on track to phase out 'cookies' used to track people's online activities while still offering ways to deliver targeted advertising (AFP Photo/LOIC VENANCE) |
San Francisco (AFP) - Google on Tuesday said is making progress in its quest to vanquish third-party "cookies" on its popular browser used to track people's online activities, a focus of many privacy activists.
The online
giant said its "Sandbox" program would still allow advertisers the
ability to deliver targeted messages, while also sparing people from being
tracked by snippets of code called "cookies" when they use its Chrome
web browser.
"We
are confident that with continued iteration and feedback, privacy-preserving
and open-standard mechanisms like the Privacy Sandbox can sustain a healthy,
ad-supported web in a way that will render third-party cookies obsolete,"
Chrome director of engineering Justin Schuh said in a post.
"Our
intention is to do this within two years."
The use of
cookies to track where people go, what they do, and what they buy online has
raised concerns about privacy violations but has also been defended as integral
to supporting free online services that survive on advertising revenue.
"Our
goal for this open source initiative is to make the web more private and secure
for users, while also supporting publishers," Schuh said.
Schuh
offered no specifics on what Google would use to replace cookies but said
"we are working actively across the ecosystem so that browsers,
publishers, developers, and advertisers have the opportunity to experiment with
these new mechanisms."
Google said
simply blocking cookies was not a good solution because it has encouraged the
use of "fingerprinting" techniques to track people which some say are
more insidious than cookies.
But it
remained unclear if eliminating third-party cookies may give the California-based
company more control of online advertising, which it dominates along with
Facebook.
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