Google launches trial for new tracking feature FLoC, automatically opts in Chrome users

[CivBase]

Summary

Google has been working on a new, open-source technology to replace third-party cookies for tracking users called Federated Learning of Cohorts (FLoC)[0].  They have launched a trial on Chrome (versions 89 and up) which automatically opts in users who sync Chrome using their Google account and have not disabled third-party cookies[1].  The trial currently only extends to users in Australia, Brazil, Canada, India, Indonesia, Japan, Mexico, New Zealand, Philippines, and the US.  EFF has been openly critical of the technology[3] and just launch a site called "Am I FLoCed" to help users determine whether FLoC has been enabled on their browser[4].  DuckDuckGo has also shared criticism and updated their "DuckDuckGo Privacy Essentials" Chrome extension to block the new technology[5].

 

Quotes

Quote

In today's web, people’s interests are typically inferred based on observing what sites or pages they visit, which relies on tracking techniques like third-party cookies or less-transparent mechanisms like device fingerprinting. It would be better for privacy if interest-based advertising could be accomplished without needing to collect a particular individual’s browsing history.

 

We plan to explore ways in which a browser can group together people with similar browsing habits, so that ad tech companies can observe the habits of large groups instead of the activity of individuals. Ad targeting could then be partly based on what group the person falls into[0].

 

- README.md, FloC repository on GitHub

 

Quote

FLoC is a new approach to interest-based advertising that both improves privacy and gives publishers a tool they need for viable advertising business models. FLoC is still in development and we expect it to evolve based on input from the web community and learnings from this initial trial[2].

 

- Marshall Vale, Product Manager at Google

 

Quote

FLoC is meant to be a new way to make your browser do the profiling that third-party trackers used to do themselves: in this case, boiling down your recent browsing activity into a behavioral label, and then sharing it with websites and advertisers. The technology will avoid the privacy risks of third-party cookies, but it will create new ones in the process. It may also exacerbate many of the worst non-privacy problems with behavioral ads, including discrimination and predatory targeting[3].

 

- Bennett Cyphers, EFF

 

Quote

But don't just take it from us. Google itself has said this new approach is at least 95% as effective as third-party cookie tracking, continuing the ability to target people based on age, gender, ethnicity, income, and many other factors. This targeting, regardless of how it's done, enables manipulation, discrimination, and filter bubbles that many people would like to avoid[5].

 

- DuckDuckGo

 

My thoughts

I stopped using Google Chrome (and most Google products) a few years ago because of growing privacy concerns with the company, so you can probably guess that I'm not a fan of this.  This tech only benefits advertising companies like Google.  They want to optimize their ads by collecting user data and using it for ad targeting.  I don't feel any better having the trackers identify me as an intersection of groups instead of as an individual.  The silver lining here is that other browser vendors haven't expressed any intent to implement the tech.  Hopefully it doesn't propagate to other Chromium-based browsers.

 

Sources

[0] https://github.com/WICG/floc

[1] https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2021/03/google-testing-its-controversial-new-ad-targeting-tech-millions-browsers-heres
[2] https://blog.google/products/chrome/privacy-sustainability-and-the-importance-of-and/

[3] https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2021/03/googles-floc-terrible-idea

[4] https://amifloced.org/

[5] https://spreadprivacy.com/block-floc-with-duckduckgo/

 

[WhitetailAni]

Guess I know what I'm doing once I get home...

Couldn't they have picked a better name?
"FLoC" just sounds weird.

[Drama Lama]

Trackers gonna track

31 minutes ago, CivBase said:

group together people with similar browsing habits, so that ad tech companies can observe the habits

I mean with current targeting systems you are sorted into groups, the difference is now that your browser says " hey I'm part of the group that get's ads for xyz". Instead of " hey I'm user 123456789 " and then the ad systems looks and gives you ads for xyz becuse in their profile about you stands that you like xyz products.

please correct me if I'm stupid and targeting systems don't work like that

It really doesn't change anything in my opinion.

 

Edited April 15, 2021 by Drama Lama

[CivBase]

45 minutes ago, Drama Lama said:

Trackers gonna track

I mean with current targeting systems you are sorted into groups, the difference is now that your browser says " hey I'm part of the group that get's ads for xyz". Instead of " hey I'm user 123456789 "

And, given you are part of enough groups, a third party can use an intersection of all those groups to create a profile for you as an individual anyway[0].  It has almost the same negative privacy implications as third-party cookies, just took a more roundabout way to get there.

 

[0] https://github.com/WICG/floc/issues/100

[RejZoR]

Laughs in Firefox. Also laughs in entirely ditching Google. I don't get it how can people become so dependent on Google. It's just so unnecessary.

[Ashley MLP Fangirl]

i've ditched Chrome like a month ago now, I'm now using Firefox on Windows and Safari on Mac exclusively. it's been nice. 

[captain_to_fire]

6 hours ago, RejZoR said:

I don't get it how can people become so dependent on Google.

When your organization/university uses Google Workspace. Also, Google Docs' collaboration tools is just way better than what everyone is offering IMO.

[captain_to_fire]

1 minute ago, gabrielcarvfer said:

Overleaf >>>>>>> Office/Docs/etc.

Why would anyone spend extra for a word processor when the cloud email provider also provides word processing, spreadsheets, and presentation (with collaboration), not to mention video conferencing (Meet), online storage (Drive), and security with MFA?

[Giganthrax]

9 minutes ago, gabrielcarvfer said:

You can do spreadsheets and presentations with latex. The rest is a different story, and Google is definitely not the best in this area.

Who is better? I'd genuinely like to know. 

[captain_to_fire]

Just now, gabrielcarvfer said:

OneDrive

I beg to differ. OneDrive doesn't have any option to remove the download button when viewing a file other than Office files. Google Drive has one.

9 minutes ago, gabrielcarvfer said:

Microsoft Teams

I'm sure Linus disagrees to this considering that they've complained a lot about Teams in multiple WAN show episodes

[Fasterthannothing]

Quote

In a blog post, Google explicitly states that it “will not build alternate identifiers to track individuals as they browse across the web” after the third-party cookies are gone.

https://www.theverge.com/platform/amp/2021/3/3/22310332/google-privacy-replacing-third-party-cookies-privacy-sandbox

 

Lol didn't take Google long to change their tune on that

[divito]

12 minutes ago, gabrielcarvfer said:

You can do spreadsheets and presentations with latex. The rest is a different story, and Google is definitely not the best in this area.

Scope of integration is fairly unmatched. I used to use 1000 different things because I wanted the best or specific things of each area I used within my computer use. I might have had the energy when I was younger to do each extra step to get from A to G, or customize scripts, or spend time troubleshooting, or waste 10 hours with a platform only to realize the final steps or some incompatibility ruins the project before it can be finished. The drop off in functionality is moot whereas the cohesiveness is desirable at this stage for lots of people. 
 

 

As for the topic at hand, much ado about nothing. It's a trial, for one; there's no guarantee this actually lasts or what obstacles this will face as the trial runs and it grows in the press.

Outside of that, most of the controversy is basically tinfoil fearmongering anyways. Google didn't invent targeted ads. They've existed and still exist in radio, television, events, conferences, and anywhere else marketing dollars are spent. Just because it's more efficient and scalable doesn't change any of that. Not to mention that it's easy to subvert in many ways.

 

[CivBase]

7 minutes ago, SlidewaysZ said:

https://www.theverge.com/platform/amp/2021/3/3/22310332/google-privacy-replacing-third-party-cookies-privacy-sandbox

 

Lol didn't take Google long to change their tune on that

Notice how they specifically said "to track individuals".  Classic misdirection.  They never intended to give up on trackers; they make a lot of money from them.

[Giganthrax]

35 minutes ago, gabrielcarvfer said:

Microsoft Teams, OneDrive, etc.

Ehhhhhhhh

 

OneDrive gives only 5gb of free storage, so that alone makes it useless for my purposes since I have 12gb of fully synced stuff via Google Drive.

 

Microsoft Teams may be decent, but we use BaseCamp and Google Chat for everything at my workplace and I don't really see any disadvantages there. 

 

Also, Office 365 looks nice, but it can't open files that aren't .docx so that makes it problematic with a ton of my own files that were saved in .odt, whereas Google Docs just opens everything no problem. 

 

I dunno, I can't see myself replacing Google's fully integrated suite with Microsoft's anytime soon. What other alternatives are there?

[Brooksie359]

2 hours ago, CivBase said:

Notice how they specifically said "to track individuals".  Classic misdirection.  They never intended to give up on trackers; they make a lot of money from them.

If its anonymous then yeah then its different. People care about personal privacy not about targeted ads. At least I am. If they can find a way to do targeted ads without having a profile on me that isn't anonymous then honestly I don't care. 

[Mihle]

When it comes to office applications, I don't use them much really, but when for what little I use them, I use Libreoffice. Mostly because I don't feel it's worth paying for Microsoft Office when I use it as little as I do.

 

I have my own NAS as cloud so don't miss OneDrive or Google Disk.

 

Only really thing I feel I am missing is OneNote. OneNote is great. I know it's a free version, but it's not the same thing, you can for one not save things locally or on my own NAS. I have not found s replacement yet so currently just storing text documents in a folder...

[divito]

8 hours ago, Mihle said:

When it comes to office applications, I don't use them much really, but when for what little I use them, I use Libreoffice. Mostly because I don't feel it's worth paying for Microsoft Office when I use it as little as I do.

 

I have my own NAS as cloud so don't miss OneDrive or Google Disk.

 

Only really thing I feel I am missing is OneNote. OneNote is great. I know it's a free version, but it's not the same thing, you can for one not save things locally or on my own NAS. I have not found s replacement yet so currently just storing text documents in a folder...

I've never really used a note app. What is something like Google Keep missing vs OneNote? 

[Mihle]

3 minutes ago, divito said:

I've never really used a note app. What is something like Google Keep missing vs OneNote? 

I just like how OneNote did it with pages and books, or categories or whatever you want to call it. One onenote sort of have multiple folder levels built in. Google Keep have tags sort of system but I find OneNote system better, but probably a taste thing.

 

I also liked how you could just write different text "boxes" different places on the page it without it having to be top to bottom like a normal text file. Or slap in photos wherever you want very easily. Don't know if I describe it any good at all tho.

 

OneNote could save note files offline or in the cloud service you want, at least it can in the 2017 variant (but not the win 10 variant or whatever it's called)

 

Also problem with Google Keep for me is that it doesn't exist as an desktop program for PCs, I don't like having everything like that in a browser, I want a Windows program.

 

Might get words down on more later.

[DarthBaggins]

I can see major backlash with this due to a large scale of school systems using Chromebooks/Chrome OS enabled devices in their systems.  

[divito]

11 hours ago, Mihle said:

I just like how OneNote did it with pages and books, or categories or whatever you want to call it. One onenote sort of have multiple folder levels built in. Google Keep have tags sort of system but I find OneNote system better, but probably a taste thing.

 

I also liked how you could just write different text "boxes" different places on the page it without it having to be top to bottom like a normal text file. Or slap in photos wherever you want very easily. Don't know if I describe it any good at all tho.

 

OneNote could save note files offline or in the cloud service you want, at least it can in the 2017 variant (but not the win 10 variant or whatever it's called)

 

Also problem with Google Keep for me is that it doesn't exist as an desktop program for PCs, I don't like having everything like that in a browser, I want a Windows program.

 

Might get words down on more later.

Most of the functionality seems similar. There are probably some UX differences that lend itself more to OneNote it seems.

And that's true, there is no desktop version for a PC. It seems you can make a copy of a note to Docs, and then make it available offline as the closest comparable.

[aom]

On 4/15/2021 at 7:06 PM, gabrielcarvfer said:

Overleaf >>>>>>> Office/Docs/etc.

You mean the site that constantly crashes under load and takes forever to actually compile. I started off using Overleaf before I realized that these massive wait time to compile my work aren't inherent to Latex, its from Overleaf.

 

Also sure LaTeX has its place and can produce a better result, but just not in anywhere near the same time. For the quality expected from documents in the workplace (unless you are in academia), you just can't compete with something fast and easy to use like Google Docs, Slides, Sheets, etc.

[Mario5]

I really dont like how much power google has

[Murasaki]

On 4/16/2021 at 1:26 AM, Ashley MLP Fangirl said:

i've ditched Chrome like a month ago now, I'm now using Firefox on Windows and Safari on Mac exclusively. it's been nice. 

I have ditched Chrome since yesterday and I'm not missing it at all (on my phone too). Firefox is great.

[AndreiArgeanu]

I feel like there is going to be some changes to the GDPR laws to include this form of tracking, assuming the current law doesn't cover FLoC in some way or another.

But yeah, I've been using Firefox for a bit over 2 years now and I haven't found yet any reason to switch back. I suspect that if this does end up getting implemented and it doesn't infringe any data protection laws Chrome will notice a significant loss of users following the update, probably not enough to 'dethrone' Chrome from being the most popular browser but definitely a noticeable difference.

[RejZoR]

4 hours ago, Murasaki said:

I have ditched Chrome since yesterday and I'm not missing it at all (on my phone too). Firefox is great.

If you want even better experience I'm gonna shill a tool of mine:

https://rejzor.wordpress.com/firefox-tweaker/

 

So you can customize Firefox even further. Mozilla does a lot of things really badly (and some really well), but when you tweak it your own way, it's still one of the best browsers out there. Especially since it's almost the only one left with its own rendering engine.