Google May Replace Cookies With Unique AdIDs 147
markjhood2003 writes "According to a story published in USA Today, an anonymous source at Google familiar with the plan has revealed that Google is developing an anonymous identifier for advertising tracking, replacing the function of third party cookies currently used by most major advertisers. The new AdID supposedly gives consumers more privacy and control over their web browsing, but the ad industry is worried about putting more power in the hands of large technology companies. Sounds like the idea could have some promise, but at this point the proposal is not public so we will probably have to wait until Google reaches out to the industry, government and consumers to provide the details."
Oh really? (Score:3, Funny)
we will probably have to wait until Google reaches out to the industry, government and consumers to provide the details.
So what you're saying is you have to pass it to find out what's in it? How very Pelosi of them!
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Probably because it combines an out-of-context quote from a major political figure with a content-less attack on Google without adding anything of substance. As a result, it's more likely to result in a political thread than doing anything to add information.
Presumably if this were about IPv6, you'd think "Oh, so we're finally getting rid of Al Gore's invention" is on-topic and not a troll too?
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No. If they did, it wouldn't have been modded "Troll".
People who are on Slashdot and then act judgmental about "Slashdotters" have a distinct lack of self-awareness. Otherwise, instead of saying "Slashdotters...", they would say, "we...".
Give consumers more privacy? (Score:5, Insightful)
Or take away their ability to block tracking as they can currently do with cookies? Article doesn't say much about how the new ID is supposed to work.
Re:Give consumers more privacy? (Score:5, Informative)
Or take away their ability to block tracking as they can currently do with cookies?
That's the basic idea. CNET covered this a few days ago. [cnet.com] "The AdID would be transmitted to advertisers and ad networks that have agreed to basic guidelines, giving consumers more privacy and control over how they browse the Web,"
Expect meaningless, easy to evade "basic guidelines", like TrustE.
Re:Give consumers more privacy? (Score:5, Interesting)
That CNET article is just a summary of the one in USA Today. Both of them are pretty light on information.
Does anybody know (or at least want to take a guess) how this shit's supposed to work? How do you store this unique ID without using cookies, or something that works just like cookies?
Re:Give consumers more privacy? (Score:5, Interesting)
It's pretty clear to me this is going to be implemented client-side in the browser, just based on the limited information available. Just like Windows Media Player's "send unique player id to content providers" option.
Firefox (funded largely by by Google) and Chrome are slightly under 40% market share, and Chrome is increasing.
All you need is Microsoft on board, or the advertising industry. They won't get the ad industry, so they need Microsoft. Or a plugin for IE that pops up an installer bubble when you use google search, gmail, or youtube. And I'm pretty sure Microsoft is on board, given their media player thing.
I expect an additional header in the HTTP request. I also expect an uptick in the number of people using a customized FireFox or Chromium that does not send this, or better yet sends a random number (leave the PRNG jokes and asides out of this, that's not the topic).
You asked for a guess.
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Maybe via Javascript? That would explain the move from Firefox to remlve the "disable Javascript" from the GUI in version 23 (use the settingssanity plugin to get it back).
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JavaScript may be involved, but controlling and tracking separate ID values for normal vs. private browsing, and control by browser settings says it's baked in to the browser somehow. Disabling JavaScript alone will not get rid of this ad ID, based on the person's description. They want a solution that will work if cookies are disabled, and falling back on JavaScript will not solve that problem.
HTML5 and persistent storage might work. And it could be done greasemonkey style in JavaScript. But the descri
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The simplest idea is that sites would require an ID to login and view content. Think OpenID, minus the open part. Sure you could change your ID, but Google would be in charge of assigning the IDs, and they're paying researchers to come up with algorithms to help figure out that ID#1234 belongs to the owner of ID#5678.
So in the end, the majority of the web will require an ID to view "free" content, and the price of the free admission is that you have to sign up for an ID that serves as an index into a vast n
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And then someone make a firefox plugin that always transmit the same ID. AD-haters will all use that, and the new trackers will see a single user browsing from thousands of machines. When that ID get blocked, they roll over to another "common ID" - and so on.
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And then someone make a firefox plugin that always transmit the same ID
Ha, I already see myself browsing dildo's and kinky sex toys for a few nights. Imagine the look on your wife's face when she sees all the ads on your machine that are "related" to my browsing. Muhahahahahaha!
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You can blame spammers for that. Unfortunately, there aren't very many ways of limiting who makes accounts that don't leave some people out of the loop.
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First, Google owns the ad networks - the vast majority of them, anyhow.
So what Google does is when you download a page using Google's ad networks, Google takes their cookie that identifies you (either anonymously, or named, if you use Google+/Google ID), and translates that to a number, probably by hashing it. Google then pass
Re:Give consumers more privacy? (Score:5, Interesting)
Article doesn't say much about how the new ID is supposed to work.
They closely cooperate with the NSA. It's all give and take.
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We give, they take.
Re:Give consumers more privacy? (Score:5, Insightful)
Anonymous identifier.
Let's just say that repeatedly until the problem sinks into all of our brains.
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They don't know who you are. They can put together a pretty good picture, but they don't have a name, address, phone number, or photo of you.
Not sure what your point is here. You are going to be tracked, and what you like and/or do will be revealed. Just like today.
They will be able to say that user 6865 dislikes Republicans, owns several Playstation products, lives in America, and has been posting on slashdot for 15 years. Demonstrates slight paranoid tendencies and distrust of authority. Between 35 a
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People are traced back to their real life identities from their online postings all the time. Unless you avoid social media and give out very, very little information on your location you can be identified pretty easy.
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It is common knowledge that advertising data miners can determine with startling accuracy the identity of an individual with only a few accumulated pieces of correlated information referenced against a large commercial database of activity. This provides a further consistent identifier to tie all those strings together, while giving the impression that the identifier is to prevent identification. This is not about what they can conclude about your identity just from one website unto itself.
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Your comment was "Anonymous identifier. Let's just say that repeatedly until the problem sinks into all of our brains."
The moment you log in to FaceBook or Google+ with your real name, it ceases to be an anonymous identifier to FaceBook or Google. I get that. And data mining can take an online identity and find a real person. But it has to be a combination of personal information that you volunteer plus that ID to stop being anonymous.
I still argue that anonymous identifier, by itself, is not the proble
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Probably for the same reason I get all the buttplug ads on Amazon. :P
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They don't know who you are. They can put together a pretty good picture, but they don't have a name, address, phone number, or photo of you.
That is one hell of a naive or uninformed perspective. There are these amazing things called relational databases full of lovely tables overflowing with easily-queried nuggets of yummy identifiable customer goodness.
Do you for one moment think your utility company, ISP, your social media site, health insurer, and our wonderful government don't share easily cross-referenced data? Hell, Lexisnexis knows more about you than your mom.
What color is the sky in "they"s world, or yours for that matter?
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>They don't know who you are.
Thats untill you login to any email id or other online account with your real name from the same IP enough times to form a link between the "anonymous" ID and the "real" ID.
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Seriously who cares how they label the privacy invasion just stop doing it, it's very annoying. I am sick of adds targeting products I have just purchased, a really seriously annoying idea, now who was the idiot who thought it was a good idea ie search for product, find what your after and for weeks there in after get adds for it, why, what is the purpose?
Just align adds with the content, it is by far less jarring and honestly will produce the most positive response and the most likely click link reactio
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
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for nearly 8 months I got nothing but ads for netbooks, long after I had quit searching for netbooks because i had bought one!
I don't care for advertising much, so I just love those.
I constantly get ads for the new television I bought a few months ago and every once in a while I click on the ad to ensure I don't get other ads that might lure me into wasting money on products I don't already have.
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Lure you? How?
Online advertisements are the complete opposite of "enticing", they have no creativity, no catchy jingles, and they don't even advertise stuff available in your country (if you aren't from the US). A far cry from what used to be professional marketing.
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And yet if they didn't work, they wouldn't exist.
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Ahh, yes, but in reality who are those adds really targeted at, the buyer or the seller. If you think about it, who do you really want to see the adds targeted at, the seller or the buyer. If you target the seller, they always see their add, in their ignorance they think this is fantastic, their add is always on line, woo hoo, and they continue to pay for them. So targeted adds one great big marketing scam targeted at the sellers, why, because it is automated. Actually aligning adds with content cost money
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In reality, most companies track conversion rates of banner ads.
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Totally agree.
On the same note, Google's ads (that go along the search results) are often very useful. So much that I unblocked those in ABP.
I have used Google Ads myself to advertise. Click-through rates of ads on their homepage are like 100 times greater than those on their "affiliate network". Difference is to such an extent that I suspect that most of the clicks on the "affiliate network" are accidental... those click-through rates were like 0.01% or so.
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Ultimately, internet advertising is a long-running scam that people will catch on to. People were sold a bunch of bullshit about the glory of advertising online. Scamsters tried to sell advertisers on the wonders of targeted demographics, precise statistics, interactivity, etc. The truth turned out to be that the statistics are meaningless, because they're often gamed and click-bot farms are abundantly scamming bucks off the advertisers. It also turned out that the interactivity didn't add anything to the i
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Seems like trackingblockers like Ghostery will need an update.
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If the tracking is done in such a way that it is impossible to know who is being tracked, then I have no problem with this. If on the other hand your "Ad-ID" can be linked to your IP at any point in time (and it is hard me to envision how this could not be the case), then to me it's just another form of cookie and I don't see how it is different at all.
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or maybe not
but would it be a cookie by law if its not a cookie at all ? maybe they should sell it like that to the ad industry, yes google sure, i need about $25k after that im sure i can fix the rest myself, feel free to donate
right
Sorry to say, but... (Score:2, Insightful)
You spelled AIDS wrong.
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Google is a targeted ad company (Score:4, Interesting)
If it were concerned about giving consumers "more privacy" on a scale unprecedented in human history, in terms of reducing the amount of data stored about them, it could simply... wipe its hard drives and close its business.
Re:Google is a targeted ad company (Score:4, Interesting)
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the way it's easy to get targeted advertising wrong makes me wonder if they would get better advertising with completely random ads.
you see, if you get it wrong then you will not get a single click on an advert. with totally random there's at least a chance at a click, but I ain't going to buy silicon boobs even if I googled for big boobs.
this adid thing though.. how is it different than cookies except that google gets all the data?
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Probably, I use self-destructing cookies on any and all cookies that are installed on my computer. Most of them are deleted the moment I leave the website, a few that I really need, are allowed to persist until I close the browser, and only one or two is allowed to remain after I close the browser. Most of the time, I wind up with random ads, assuming I get them at all.
I can't recall the last time I actually clicked on one of those links, and I don't think I've ever bought anything as a result of one of tho
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The ads that target my search terms, are often quite relevant to me. It advertises goods or services that I happen to be interested in there and then. And if I'm indeed looking for commercial results, possibly after looking for reviews and other information on a product, good chance I'll click them.
And no need for invasive privacy. They don't really need to know my age or anything - just my location. And that they can see from my IP address. And if looking for highly local services like a restaurant around
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I ignored the first paragraph as you sounded like an advert for a marketing company. All that can be done without having a system of charging people per listing or per click, where people who pay more get better placed, and the recording and auditing is done by the same company which performs the brokering.
As for the second paragraph, true enough. Although the more they know about "you", the more likely they can choose a set of ads which you're likely to click on - they do it because it works, not to amuse
Awesome! (Score:5, Insightful)
Now how do i block them?
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Install Firefox. And if Firefox adopts it, patch and rebuild it.
This. Google can develop all of the proprietary shit it likes, but if it only works in Chrome then all they will manage to to is kill Chrome in the marketplace.
Here's how I'll use my newly gained power... (Score:4, Funny)
...The new AdID supposedly gives consumers more privacy and control over their web browsing...
I'll disable tracking by default. And Google should take my "threat" as guaranteed. I am not alone I know.
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Might be quite hard to do if they're sneaky enough. Let's better disable all requests to tracking and ad servers altogether.
Which differs from current only sane state... how?
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This!
At first glance, "anonymous" tracking sounds like an ideal compromise. We get to support websites we visit, without giving up our privacy in the process... Right?
Now drop this dream-scenario into the real world. Google intends to provide a way to globally, uniquely identify "you", anonymously. That works juuust fine - Until you give someone's "partner" (like Amazon, NewEgg, Expedia, etc)
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I guess ABP will take care of this one before it's released. So nothing to worry about.
First in line... (Score:5, Funny)
Oh goodie! Another ID number to protect my privacy!
Can get AdID #1?
I want to be the first and most anonymous.
-
Online Advertising is terrible (Score:5, Insightful)
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Pretty much this.
I don't actually have a problem with advertising in general.. it just seems to really suck. Only time I ever really click on an ad is when the ad is so out there that I just have to know what they are selling (which I know is a tactic, but when they get me with it I figure they've earned my eyes for a minute or two).
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I don't actually have a problem with advertising in general.. it just seems to really suck.
That's because you still think you can separate the act of advertising from the type of person who is attracted to the profession and desires to perform this sort of spying, deception, and manipulation.
Once you realize this kind of reductionism is a self-limitation, you will understand how and why it sucks and why it's not going to be fixed. Advertising, marketing, and PR as we know them today are concepts that cannot be reformed. They are flawed and exploitative and easily abused at their core. No am
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If it sucked, or weren't effective, or gathered no sales, or just in general didn't work, it would not be a billions of dollars industry. You are probably not one of the common sheeple who follow predictable patterns. You don't fit the model, so they fall back on the potato peeler you bought.
I have several plugins to discourage tracking, and I get the most ridiculous nonsense, for the lowest common denominator. "W
Re:Online Advertising is terrible (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't actually have a problem with advertising in general.
I do. At least the billboard / banner headline compete for eyeballs sort of stuff. Pre-Internet I can see that it had its place in letting people know that products existed. But now there are a plethora of ways that people can get their product known, so it is just one of those pointless activities that the rest of us have to pay for wrapped up in the product we buy, for no added value.
Which is why I block the hell out off all advertising. When I want to buy something, I research and make my choice. When I am not buying I want products to keep the fuck out of my face.
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I'd like a "stop advertising this" button and so w (Score:2)
That's a good idea. More generally, "stop showing me ads for this, I'm not going to buy it (or don't care to have it show up where other people might see it on my screen). That would be a win-win for consumers and advertisers.
I don't care for the fact that advertisers have a profile of me, but I do like seeing ads that might actually interest me. eBay does a good job of showing me listings I might want to look at.
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How many potato peelers do they expect me to buy?
One for yourself each time the one you bought for yourself wears out, and one for each of your friends. You aren't so selfish that you'd buy yourself a potato peeler and not buy one for you best buddies, are you? How do you expect them to peel their potatoes? Do you do the peeling for them?
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See, they are only thinking of you when they ask you for access to all your private data, because if they only knew you already have 7, they can stop trying to sell you more. It's for your benefit. Really...
Advertising ID? (Score:4, Interesting)
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Ads and Trackers? (Score:5, Interesting)
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There's a few sites I go to which detect I'm using an ad blocker and display text telling me how they rely on advertising to support them.
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When you enter a URL in the browser, it issues a GET request, then the plugin parses the response and allows the browser to make subsequent r
No thanks (Score:3)
I'll stick with no-script and private browsing mode. I'm sorry if you are making a living on advertising revenue but your revenue stream has basically come down to invasive douchenozzeling and I haven't any use for that. Go put up a billboard, maybe I'll drive by it.
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You don't understand private browsing mode. It does not make you private on the Web. It only (unsuccessfully) attempts to clean up your browser histroy to provide privacy from your spouse/children/parents.
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what a choice (Score:5, Funny)
On the one hand. I have Google. On the other hand, I have the ad industry.
Eww, let me go wash my hands.
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Google *is* the ad industry.
Anonymous? (Score:2)
isnt a cookie already a number (Score:1)
so its like a uuid number
they will probably need us to login with our "google id" before they can generate a lasting number
otherwise we can just change the number
here is a option
---------->find out somebody elses "google id" # and circulate it amongst a group
--------->everyone changes thier number to that single id #
--------->PROFIT !!
captcha=brainy
A third-party cookie by any other name.... (Score:5, Insightful)
...would stink as bad. So all it really is is a cookie that's completely controlled by Google. Well played Google, well played.
Google wants to give (Score:2)
Yay for AIDS!
Aptly named (Score:3)
Oh, the irony. (Score:2)
but the ad industry is worried about putting more power in the hands of large technology companies
I guess they'd be the ones to know how sleazy an industry can be.
I am working on a plugin idea (Score:2)
Wait... the internet has ads? (Score:2)
Google experience (Score:2)
I logged on to YouTube today it said I appear to be logging in from an "unusual location" (e.g. same IP I've used for years) please give us your telephone number so we can verify you.
Unless someone can explain how providing information I never gave them in the first place (and will never provide) can possibly serve to verify my YouTube account the motive for this was never "For your protection" as stated it was to get more information about my identity..spun into a big fat LIE.
I have long since lost any tru
One Thing Google Has Never Studied (Score:2)
Does Anybody Still Allow Those Connections? (Score:1)
I've got every ad server I've identified pointed at my own dummy pixel server because I kinda like pages to paint instantly instead of taking forever for doubleclick or edgewhatever (jeez, I haven't seen them in so long I've started to forget their names) to get around to sending something I don't want. Am I the only one doing that?
Google will give me AIDs??? (Score:1)
I DON'T WANT AIDS!!!
follow the money (Score:2)
Always, always follow the money.
Googles main business is selling ads. So who will profit from this?
They wouldn't. (Score:2)
This just makes it too easy, too easy to turn off AdID or install a plugin which truly muddies the waters by giving back a random AdID every time it is requested.
It's much harder to turn cookies off because of all the functionality they provide. AdIDs on the other hand - no functionality for us.
A model that works - Smashwords (Score:2)
I found a new sequel to a series I had read.
Google led me to Smashwords. I read some free, then bought
unencumbered epub,pdb,mobi,txt. Credit card or paypal.
Devoured it and next day bought 3 more.
Now have a library in Smashwords, reviewed one.
I think there might be a coupon for reviewers.
Google should:
Buy a bank.
Beat visa and paypal out on the net.
Get a percentage for introduction.
Stop the ads, or offer no ads but another1% margin.
Integrate better with all common pos systems,
or sell own. Show recommendations
Be careful about it, Google (Score:2)
Be very careful. I am watching you.
Re:Anyone else smell bullshit? (Score:5, Interesting)
Google instant search is a keylogger, plain and simple.
You're obviously presenting only the cynic's side of the argument, but even so, it's even more obvious now than ever that combining the address and search text boxes in a web browser really is a security/privacy risk.
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You're obviously presenting only the cynic's side of the argument, but even so, it's even more obvious now than ever that combining the address and search text boxes in a web browser really is a security/privacy risk.
yeah, wow - great point (assuming typeahead is active)
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