Despite “Do Not Track” being a standard option on Firefox, Chrome and Safari (but not Microsoft Edge), many unscrupulous advertisers are still secretly tracking the browsing habits of internet users. That’s why the Electronic Freedom Foundation has teamed with Adblock, Medium, Mixpanel and DuckDuckGo to create a stronger standard.
“The failure of the ad industry and privacy groups to reach a compromise on DNT has led to a viral surge in ad blocking, massive losses for Internet companies dependent on ad revenue, and increasingly malicious methods of tracking users and surfacing advertisements online,” Disconnect CEO Casey Oppenheim said in a statement. “Our hope is that this new DNT approach will protect a consumer’s right to privacy and incentivize advertisers to respect user choice, paving a path that allows privacy and advertising to coexist.”
The new standard will work hand in hand with ad- and tracker-blocking software to more fully protect users against commercial snooping attempts. It basically allows domain operators to declare that they’re onboard with DNT so that privacy-protecting software knows how aggressively to block or anonymize communications with the site.
Filed under:
Internet, Apple, Microsoft, Google
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Source:
EFF
Tags: adblock, advertising, apple, browser, chrome, DoNotTrack, edge, EFF, firefox, google, microsoft, privacy, projectspartan, safari, security, standards