Google: User disappears in the crowd
Posted: Sat Feb 01, 2025 7:09 am
google-privacy-first-floc
With the "Privacy Sandbox" package of measures announced in mid-2019, Google set itself the goal of combining advertising and privacy in the most targeted way possible. The "Federated Learning of Cohorts" (FLoC) concept now presented envisages grouping together groups of users with similar interests and behaviors instead of individual users. According to Google, this would allow the individual to virtually disappear in the crowd. Individual surfing behavior would remain hidden from the eyes of advertisers.
Google promises advertisers that there will be little drop in performance. In initial tests, the FLoC concept continued to achieve 95% of conversions per US dollar spent in direct comparison to cookie-based tracking. However, according to Google, the exact results depend on the algorithm settings and the type of target group to be reached.
Conclusion: Google as a pioneer in a cookie-free tracking world?
With its efforts to help shape the advertising world in a post-cookie exit mobile numbers list era, Google is at least way ahead of the industry. Sooner or later, other platforms will also have to ask themselves how they can continue to achieve the best possible results without cookies. Facebook, for example, has so far accepted current developments such as Apple's ATT* with gritted teeth and has adapted to the data protection regulations. A system of its own that can ensure high-performance tracking in the future is not in sight.
Google is clearly thinking a few steps ahead. The first tests seem to confirm the effectiveness of the Google solution. However, the question remains whether the new technology will create new privacy problems. The US consumer protection organization EFF says that it is possible to imagine a world without the problems of targeted advertising instead of reinventing the tracking wheel.
With FLoC, Google is the first major advertising channel to dare to position itself for the future independently of third-party cookies. It is only a matter of time before other advertisers also have to seriously address this issue. Although this will certainly not solve all problems, there does not seem to be a good, practically implementable alternative to Google's "FLoC" solution on the market.
With the "Privacy Sandbox" package of measures announced in mid-2019, Google set itself the goal of combining advertising and privacy in the most targeted way possible. The "Federated Learning of Cohorts" (FLoC) concept now presented envisages grouping together groups of users with similar interests and behaviors instead of individual users. According to Google, this would allow the individual to virtually disappear in the crowd. Individual surfing behavior would remain hidden from the eyes of advertisers.
Google promises advertisers that there will be little drop in performance. In initial tests, the FLoC concept continued to achieve 95% of conversions per US dollar spent in direct comparison to cookie-based tracking. However, according to Google, the exact results depend on the algorithm settings and the type of target group to be reached.
Conclusion: Google as a pioneer in a cookie-free tracking world?
With its efforts to help shape the advertising world in a post-cookie exit mobile numbers list era, Google is at least way ahead of the industry. Sooner or later, other platforms will also have to ask themselves how they can continue to achieve the best possible results without cookies. Facebook, for example, has so far accepted current developments such as Apple's ATT* with gritted teeth and has adapted to the data protection regulations. A system of its own that can ensure high-performance tracking in the future is not in sight.
Google is clearly thinking a few steps ahead. The first tests seem to confirm the effectiveness of the Google solution. However, the question remains whether the new technology will create new privacy problems. The US consumer protection organization EFF says that it is possible to imagine a world without the problems of targeted advertising instead of reinventing the tracking wheel.
With FLoC, Google is the first major advertising channel to dare to position itself for the future independently of third-party cookies. It is only a matter of time before other advertisers also have to seriously address this issue. Although this will certainly not solve all problems, there does not seem to be a good, practically implementable alternative to Google's "FLoC" solution on the market.