Today, billions of people around the world turn to Chrome and Android to work, communicate, shop, and stay entertained. And the recent acceleration in digital adoption means that you can now connect with more customers and grow your business faster than ever before across the web and apps.
As an industry, we must continue to improve user privacy, while providing the tools and insights you need to grow your business.
But consumers are increasingly concerned about their privacy as they shift their behaviours online. People expect companies to treat their data responsibly, and they worry about being tracked across the internet. As an industry, we must continue to improve user privacy, while providing the tools and insights you need to grow your business.
That’s why Chrome plans to phase out third-party cookies once alternative solutions in the Privacy Sandbox can support key use cases — including reaching people with relevant ads and measuring the impact of those ads — without tracking users across sites.
Bringing the Privacy Sandbox to Android
We recently shared that we’re bringing the Privacy Sandbox to Android to strengthen privacy protections for Android users while continuing to help app developers, advertisers, and publishers grow their businesses. Our goal is to develop solutions for Android that operate without cross-app identifiers (including advertising ID) and limit how user data is shared. This way, app developers can connect with their audience in effective and private ways, while people can continue using their favorite Android apps for free, knowing that their privacy is protected.
Today, Android users can choose to reset or delete their advertising ID, or opt out of ads personalisation. With Android 12, we also introduced a Privacy dashboard to help users understand when their data is accessed and used by apps they’ve installed. And soon, we’ll update Google Play with a new data-safety section that requires developers to publish their apps’ privacy and security practices. People prefer brands that empower them to be in control of the information they share, so this is an opportunity for app businesses to be more transparent about their data practices and approaches to privacy.
Building more private and effective solutions will take time
It’s going to take time for the industry to shift toward these new privacy-preserving technologies. We welcome participation from across the industry to shape the Privacy Sandbox on Android, including sharing feedback on our initial design proposals to help build solutions that work for the ecosystem. While we’re at the early stages of this journey, we’ve already heard encouraging feedback from app partners like Rovio about this path forward. “We support Google’s effort to elevate privacy standards on the platform, while making it easier for users to understand how their data is being used,” said Rovio CEO Alex Pelletier-Normand.
We also know that blunt approaches to ads privacy can drive usage of covert tracking mechanisms like device fingerprinting, resulting in worse outcomes for user privacy. So, similar to our approach on the web, we’re investing our efforts into sustainable innovations that are both more private and effective for businesses. We plan to continue supporting existing ads platform features for at least two years while we develop these new technologies. And we’ll provide substantial notice ahead of any future changes.
Investing in privacy now can help you be ready for what’s next
While these new privacy-preserving technologies are being developed, it’s never too early to build a more private marketing strategy. You can start by creating value for your customers to build deeper first-party relationships. Whether you deliver useful information, social connection, or entertainment, when people see that value in their direct relationship with your brand, 90% of them are more comfortable engaging and sharing data with you, which can help make future interactions even more helpful and relevant.
In many cases, publishers and advertisers won’t need to directly adopt the new privacy-preserving technologies coming with the Privacy Sandbox. So another way you can prepare is by engaging your ad tech partners to adopt solutions that build on these new technologies in Chrome and Android. Finally, you can stay up to date on our Privacy Sandbox website for the web and Android, where we provide regular updates on designs, timelines, and progress.
