So, we all know what Cookies are; little packets of code that hitch a ride on our browsers and tell the world how shady we are. They allow marketers to target “messaging” based on browser specific information. For analogy purposes – Imagine your Browser as an iPhone camera with a bright spotlight illuminating your travels through the web, recording your every step. Why they named it after a baked confection nobody knows; why not Cupcakes… or Scones?
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But this lynchpin of the shadowy, seedy, multibillion dollar surveillance industry is being phased out …and Google is leading the charge. That’s right, the most transparent, privacy respecting, tax paying, non-manipulative, intellectual property protecting firm in existence is proposing the Privacy Sandbox; an initiative to build a privacy first ad-supported web (insert uncontrollable tear inducing laughter). Whereas cookies went from delicious treat to highly controversial spyware, a sandbox went from playground hot spot to a fair use of data boundary set up by the biggest evil digital Empire in the galaxy (insert Imperial March / Darth Vader theme).
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The leading proposal in the Privacy Sandbox is something called the Federated Learning of Cohorts, or FLoC. FLoC’s are being sold as an effective replacement signal for third party cookies. No longer will the data taxonomy specific to each individual user be made available to a DSP. Instead, “it” will need to prospect by groups of people who show similar browsing activity (as determined by algorithms ingesting troves of Google Chrome intel). Sounds to me like Google wants the data all to themselves, but what do I know? Whatever. I’m more fascinated by the BIRD acronyms they’ve made ready. It doesn’t end with FLoC of seagulls!
There’s:
TURTLEDOVE – Two Uncorrelated Requests, Then Locally-Executed Decision On Victory
SPARROW – Secure Private Advertising Remotely Run On Webserver
PARROT – The Publisher Auction Responsibility Retention Revision of Turtledove
Are you kidding me? This is a prank, right?! Twitter and Tweeting weren’t enough? And don’t tell me they backed into “FLoC”, because it could have just as easily been GAnG (Groups Aggregated Nonetheless by Google).
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