Google ads chief: How to restore trust around data privacy

On the Internet, ads support businesses like Google, which give people around the world free access to information. Ads also help media companies, publishers, and small businesses draw attention to their offerings.

But the ad industry today—Google included—is facing an erosion of trust. Some 72% of Americans feel that almost all of what they do online is being tracked by advertisers, technology firms, or other companies, and 81% say that the potential risks they face because of data collection outweigh the benefits, according to a study by Pew Research Center.

It is understandable that consumers feel this way, given how hard it is to follow how individual data is shared these days. Now, increasingly, we’re seeing government respond to people’s demands for privacy, with the enactment of Europe’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and U.S. state laws governing consumer online privacy.

It’s become clear that the ad-supported web needs to evolve to better support privacy and restore trust. We need to rethink the type of tools we have relied on to fund the open web, like third-party cookies—bits of code that help advertisers track people across the Internet.

It would be easier, in the short term, for advertising companies to put our collective heads in the sand or make minimal changes based on data privacy regulations. But these approaches will continue to degrade trust with users and spark concerns from regulators. To move forward as an industry, we need to take bold action.

The largest browsers, including Chrome, have either already phased out third-party cookies or are in the process of doing so. Last month Google announced that once these cookies go away, we will not replace them with new types of identifiers that are being created to enable the same level of individual tracking.

At Google, we’re choosing a new path toward privacy-centered advertising. Instead of tracking individual users across the web to determine their preferences, as we had previously done, we’ll now rely on other methods to determine which ads to show them.

The centerpiece of our strategy is the Privacy Sandbox, a group of new technologies built in collaboration with others in the web and advertising communities. Its goal is to help protect individual privacy and restore trust in ads. Without ads, the web could become a series of paywalls, limiting access to content to those who can afford to pay for it.

With the Privacy Sandbox, we’re putting a great deal of effort into keeping individuals anonymous by observing their behavior and placing them in large groups of people with similar interests—but not based on who they are. Advertisers can then serve ads based on those groupings, instead of targeting people individually.

It’s like going to a county fair—the vendors don’t know who you are, but they know lots of people will be looking for art, food, or gifts, and so they set up their booths to serve that audience. The advertisers trying to reach funnel cake fans can’t see who exactly in the crowd is seeking out funnel cake, and they don’t need to.

This innovative technology, and others like it, shows a path where relevant advertising and ad-supported content can coexist with a private and secure experience for people browsing the web.

To ensure we’re successful in this new approach, we’re already collaborating with the advertising industry, including groups such as the Partnership for Responsible Addressable Media and the Interactive Advertising Bureau, as we work to create industrywide user privacy standards.

We hope other ad-supported companies will join us. It’s already been encouraging to see support from ad leaders including Unilever, Nestlé, Mondelez, and PMG as we collectively take action to restore individual privacy.

Today, individuals are tracked closely by many companies—including Google—as they travel the web. If an ad has ever followed you around, even after you’ve purchased a product, you’ve experienced this firsthand. Through the Privacy Sandbox, we’re encouraging a shift away from this approach.

Internet access is for everyone. Privacy should be too.

Jerry Dischler is vice president and general manager of ads at Google.