Google Ad Changes Face UK Probe in First Shot at Big Tech (bloomberg.com) 30
Google is the U.K.'s first big post-Brexit antitrust target as regulators opened a probe into the company's planned changes to curb publishers' collection of advertising data. From a report: The Competition and Markets Authority said it's investigating Google's so-called privacy sandbox changes that could "undermine the ability of publishers to generate revenue and undermine competition in digital advertising, entrenching Google's market power." The probe adds to Google's legal headaches around the world. The Mountain View, California-based company faces lawsuits from the U.S. Department of Justice and multiple states over allegedly anticompetitive practices. The U.K. probe focuses on Google's decision last year to phase out third-party cookies that help advertisers monitor customers' browsing habits and pinpoint the effectiveness of different advertising. Google's Chrome is the dominant web browser and the changes will be followed by rival products based on Google technology, such as Microsoft's Edge.
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Posting AC for obvious reasons.
Yeah, you're a coward.
I use gmail as my primary and I criticize google under my real name. That policy may come back to bite me, but at least I'm standing up for what I believe in. You? Not so much.
In this case Google is actually reducing the amount of data they sell to others, and the UK is suing them for it, because they want to make sure that others can collect your data.
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He's making concerted effort to block google and stop using its services. What is it you're doing? Besides continuing to use gmail, of course.
I'm frequently and repeatedly agitating for google to be regulated and/or broken up into smaller pieces. It's idiotic to burn it down when it could be fixed. That would be inanely wasteful.
This is my surprised face (Score:4, Interesting)
Google is the U.K.'s first big post-Brexit antitrust target as regulators opened a probe into the company's planned changes to curb publishers' collection of advertising data.
EU has GDPR.
UK has a desperate need for cash, and in order to get it, will take Google to court over stopping their practices of selling users' data to others.
If you can't innovate, litigate.
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EU has GDPR.
UK has a desperate need for cash ...
The UK has a UK GDPR, which is basically the same and we've held on to it.
And no, we do not have a desperate need for cash. We didn't get cash from the EU anyway, but we've paid into the EU, remember?
You're the one who is desperate and cannot stop pushing your own stupid agenda of EU nationalism. We've left, get over it.
Re: This is my surprised face (Score:3)
You've left, and now we are seeing the predictable consequences. Leaving was stupid, get over it.
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You've left, and now we are seeing the predictable consequences. Leaving was stupid, get over it.
A probe is not a sentencing nor a law suit, my friend. It's an investigation into a matter people are concerned about. The EU might do the same at a later time. There is no reason for you to hate it, because there is no outcome yet. You should welcome it.
Their probe is in the wrong places (Score:2)
I'm all in favour of wha
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You can already turn off cookies, third party cookies or all of them. Google's privacy sandbox then makes it impossible to use third party cookies, which means any service relying on third party cookies will no longer work with Chrome. You are not getting more privacy, but you are getting less options.
It also doesn't change that many web sites use Google fonts, Google analytics and even your router and ISP may be using Google DNS, thus Google keeps collecting data about you, which you only may not know abou
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You can already turn off cookies, third party cookies or all of them. Google's privacy sandbox then makes it impossible to use third party cookies, which means any service relying on third party cookies will no longer work with Chrome. You are not getting more privacy, but you are getting less options.
It also doesn't change that many web sites use Google fonts, Google analytics and even your router and ISP may be using Google DNS, thus Google keeps collecting data about you, which you only may not know about.
Except they're covering all of what you just said. Their approach is about much more than just third-party cookies. Their aim is k-anonymity when it comes to web browser fingerprinting techniques, pushing for the use of anonymous DoH servers by default, wilful IP blindness, referrer clamping (goodbye analytics), constraining JavaScript and much, much more.
They want to replace all the unscrupulous tracking methods with transparent ones calculated client-side which can be very easily opted out of (in the
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Or just leave the UK. That seems like the best option at the moment. This place is fucked, there's no coming back from this in the foreseeable future.
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"EU nationalism" (not really a nation but oh well...) is no different than the "UK nationalism" that made you to leave the EU. You may think the EU agenda stupid, that's your prerogative, but one is also free to think that that UK agenda is stupid as well and to say so. Freedom of speech and all that, get over it.
There are differences... Many EU supporters don't recognise themselves as nationalists although the idea is to create one European nation. They are utterly blind to their own EU nationalism. The EU parliament and commissions don't have an opposition, which makes it look like the EU couldn't do anything wrong, while people in support of their own nation, no matter if this is in the UK, Germany, France, or elsewhere, get labelled as nationalists, racists and fascists. National politics then has opposition and
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So the lack of analysis and flaws is not because it's not possible, but because nobody cares enough.
The nationalism in the countries is created by people who do care. They are not nobody. You think there is nationalism only on one side, but look closer at history. Germany's old nationalism tried to create a 3rd Reich and because it lacked opposition did people not care either. They ended up being in bliss over it and many simply didn't want to believe what was really going on. It's a similar mindset to what we see happening in Europe and it is happening again. Nothing bad is so far happening, but the mind
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Google dosn't sell users' data to others. That's their gold mine. They sell gold, not the mine. I.e. they will let you specify what kind of audience you want to target ads at, and they will mine their own data for the correct people to advertise to.
But they will not sell you that data. If they did, they'd be out of clients very quickly, as they'd have nothing of value to sell.
The problem that legislators have with it is twofold. First the way that they collect and how much data they collect. And second, the
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Google dosn't sell users' data to others. That's their gold mine.
What they are being investigated right now for by the UK is making it harder for advertisers to harvest users' data. They don't literally sell users' data to others, but they DO currently host services that make it easy for others to collect users' data. They are taking steps to make that more difficult, and the UK is investigating them for it. If there's a meaningful difference between that and what I said above, I can't identify it.
Enemy of my enemy... (Score:2)
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I view anything that harms Google's business of raping everyone's privacy for profit is a good thing.
But this is a move to put our data into more hands than just Google's. Google will still have the data, but they will be forced to let others have it too, so those others can also rape your privacy. Your solo rape will become a gang rape, but it sounds like you are looking forward to it.
Change is a noun; Face is the verb. (Score:3)
s/Face/Trigger/g would read much smoother, but I'm not a journalist what do I know.
Own the consequences (Score:2)
This is exact what brexit supporters voted for, they loudly and persistently said for the last four years that they knew exactly what they were voting, they understood the consequences, they dismissed and ridiculed all the warnings as #ProjectFear .
Well this it, this is #ProjectReality , this is what you voted for this, yet somehow, now that things are going wrong, somehow all the consequences are the fault of someone else. Just own the consequences of your decision and stop blaming others, it is getting
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This is a probe, meaning, they are looking into the matter rather than ignoring it all together. This is good, because it will help clarify the situation. And even in the worst case can one still use Mozilla instead of Chrome.
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Google's Taxes (Score:2)
That's a tax rate of 2.75%.
At the same time, the basic corporation tax that Google should have paid was 19%. The difference between what they should have paid and what they actually paid (they should have paid £304 million) amounts to £260 million. Yes, someone is going to point out that Google avoided the tax, they didn't evade paying it. (The former is legal, bu
Google's liability (Score:2)
Google's liability is their tax setup. They have sales people in London, but claim that all sales originate in Ireland for tax purposes.
It's likely that the UK will challenge this claim.