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Late last week, it emerged that Google intends to ignore a call by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) — the international body that works to guide the development of web standards — to rethink the Topics API: A key ad-targeting component of Google’s so-called Privacy Sandbox proposal to evolve the adtech stack that Chrome supports for targeted advertising.
Topics refers to an ad-targeting component of the Sandbox proposal that is based on tracking web users’ interests via their browser.
The W3C Technical Architecture Group (TAG) raised a series of concerns following a request from Google last March for an “early design review” of the Topics API — writing last week that its “initial view” is Google’s proposed Topics API fails to protect users from “unwanted tracking and profiling” and maintains the status quo of “inappropriate surveillance on the web.”
“We do not want to see it proceed further,” added Amy Guy, commenting on behalf of the TAG.
The TAG’s take is not the first downbeat assessment of Topics. Browser engine developers WebKit and Mozilla also recently gave a thumbs-down to Google’s approach — with the former warning against preexisting privacy deficiencies on the web being used as “excuses for privacy deficiencies in new specs and proposals” and the latter deeming Topics “more likely to reduce the usefulness of the information for advertisers than it provides meaningful protection for privacy.”
And the risk of the web user experience fragmenting if there’s only limited support among browsers for Topics — which could lead to implementing sites seeking to block visitors who are using non-Chromium browsers — is another of the concerns flagged by the TAG.
Despite deepening opposition from the world of web infrastructure to Google’s approach, the U.K.’s privacy watchdog — a key oversight body in this context as the Information Commission’s Office (ICO) it’s actively engaged in assessing the…
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