Google ad tracking enhanced
In addition to tracking your searches, Google wants to track the links you visit. The Official Google Blog says it will make the ads you see more interesting:
We think we can make online advertising even more relevant and useful by using additional information about the websites people visit. Today we are launching “interest-based” advertising as a beta test on our partner sites and on YouTube. These ads will associate categories of interest — say sports, gardening, cars, pets — with your browser, based on the types of sites you visit and the pages you view. We may then use those interest categories to show you more relevant text and display ads.
Note that tracking the links that PC users visit is not new, just new from Google. MacWorld explains the change in Google’s approach:
Google currently targets advertising at surfers in one of two ways: either based on the keywords they look for using its search engine, or based on the content of Web pages they visit on the sites of partners enrolled in its AdSense program. Ads targeted in this way can only reflect surfers interests at the moment the ads are displayed, whereas the new system will allow targeted ads to be displayed on unrelated sites or in response to unrelated searches. For example, a surfer identified as interested in running might be shown ads for new shoes even when visiting a site about cooking recipes, or when conducting a search about airfares.
Google says that it is being very open about the tracking and provides ways for surfers to opt out of the tracking. Still, privacy issues worry some observers and Ars Technica writes:
The key issue that Google will undoubtedly deal with for years to come will be—of course—privacy. Needless to say, Google’s announcement has the alarms going off with privacy advocates, and some users are already uneasy with the idea. Google is attempting to ally those fears by letting users opt out of the new advertising model, and has even designed a browser plug-in that maintains the opt-out choice (in case you’re the compulsive cookie-clearing type).
Google is careful to note that the new system doesn’t attach any identifying information to the cookie, though the mere fact that it exists is already too much for some critics. “Google might well hype their targeting system as a boon to pet owners, but the reality is that the service will track just about everything you do and everything you’re interested in, no matter how personal or sensitive,” Privacy International head Simon Davies told the BBC. He and others believe that the system should off by default.
Also, Computerworld has an article called Privacy groups rip Google’s targeted advertising plan. The title says it all.
Note that you have to opt out or you get tracked. Also, remember that Google recently acquired DoubleClick, an advertising group that has been tracking people for years. My advice is to keep your cookies cleaned up.
Added later: In the New York Times Bits blog, Saul Hansell gives a detailed explanation of Google’s ad tracking controls.
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