Privacy Sandbox – Open standards to enhance privacy on the web
What&#x27;s funny is, despite all the criticism this is getting on Hacker News, this move is probably going to end up doing more to improve the online privacy of the average user than every ad blocker and tracking blocker has combined over the last decade or so.<p>Google, the world largest ad provider and browser vendor, is essentially proposing to tear down the web&#x27;s current free-for-all cookie-based ad targeting and conversion tracking system, and replace it with a privacy-respecting one built on standardized APIs implemented by the user&#x27;s browser. If they&#x27;re even <i>moderately</i> successful at this, it&#x27;s going to be a <i>huge</i> improvement to the current status quo of online advertising from a privacy perspective.<p>For those who haven&#x27;t, read the Chromium blog post on this effort[1] and the associated early proposals[2]. They&#x27;re a lot more concrete about what exactly this new vision entails.<p>And for those cynics who are skeptical of this effort just because of their preconceptions surrounding the company proposing it, consider this: Google has every reason to want to improve the reputation of online advertising. Better, more privacy-respecting ads mean less people blocking ads, which means more revenue for Google. Last year Chrome implemented a built-in ad blocker for a similar reason[3]. Personalized ad targeting doesn&#x27;t have to mean compromises to user privacy, and Google intends to prove it.<p>[1]: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;blog.chromium.org&#x2F;2019&#x2F;08&#x2F;potential-uses-for-privacy-sandbox.html" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;blog.chromium.org&#x2F;2019&#x2F;08&#x2F;potential-uses-for-privacy...</a><p>[2]: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.chromium.org&#x2F;Home&#x2F;chromium-privacy&#x2F;privacy-sandbox" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.chromium.org&#x2F;Home&#x2F;chromium-privacy&#x2F;privacy-sandb...</a><p>[3]: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;blog.chromium.org&#x2F;2017&#x2F;06&#x2F;improving-advertising-on-web.html" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;blog.chromium.org&#x2F;2017&#x2F;06&#x2F;improving-advertising-on-w...</a>