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posted by martyb on Thursday May 07 2020, @01:32PM   Printer-friendly
from the clean-your-dough dept.

European Authorities Ban Dirty Cookie Practices in GDPR Update:

When GDPR rolled out across the European Union back in 2018, the sweeping legal framework pledged to bring consumer privacy and protection to the forefront. In the years since then, we've seen the adtech industry at large do its collective darnedest to undermine these laws at every turn, and largely get away with it, thanks in part to the squishy phrasing of some of the legislation's most critical clauses.

Now, European authorities are stepping in to cut that squishiness a bit. On Monday, the European Data Protection Board—the Union's oversight committee for GDPR-related issues—released a 31-page manual (pdf) calling out some of the slimier practices used by adtech companies to fudge consent on an internet browser's behalf.

These new guidelines specifically call out the sites that assume a user's agreement to be tracked and targeted based on say, the way they scroll down a webpage, rather than relying on their explicit agreement to that deal. Also called out in the memo are "cookie walls"—a cute name for the not-so-cute tactic where sites bar internet browsers from accessing their content unless they agree to allowing cookies and trackers on the site.

These are both tactics that directly step on the concept of user consent. [...] GDPR was written to require that websites garner a visitor's consent before they handle that visitor's data, and before they pass that data down the garbled supply chain of third parties in the adtech ecosystem. As you might imagine, the GDPR painstakingly lays out exactly what does and doesn't qualify as consent, requiring that, in short, these websites explain the tech used to track the visitors in a clear and upfront way. It also requires that they offer these visitors an easy way to opt in or out of this sort of on-page tech.


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  • (Score: 5, Interesting) by gtomorrow on Thursday May 07 2020, @06:00PM (1 child)

    by gtomorrow (2230) on Thursday May 07 2020, @06:00PM (#991410)

    While there are volumes and volumes of questionable laws and regulations on the books of every region on this planet, I respectfully submit that the subject at hand is not one of them. I don't want to be sold out and spied upon nine times over just to read an article on a website...but you do? Are robocalls a good idea in your opinion? I guess you have the freedom to not answer the phone, even 20 times a day. It's your "choice," right?

    Wait a minute...I bet you're one of those "people" more concerned with going to the beach instead of not spreading a devastating virus. Freedom over stupidity uber alles, damn the consequences! NB: I didn't say "Security over freedom," just to be crystal clear.

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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 09 2020, @06:32PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 09 2020, @06:32PM (#992117)

    no, i won't visit those sites anyways, b/c i'm not an ignorant slave.
    robocallers can't get my number b/c i run my own pseudo phone company using voip.
    Regarding the beach, i don't know why you twist the point by acting like just b/c people are in favor of freedom , they must also in favor if irresponsibility.
    I'm for people keeping their natural born rights. That does not mean i advocate that they should be able to violate your rights.
    I am not responsible for dictating how you raise or don't even birth your kids.
    that's on you.
    i'm also not responsible for invisible viruses and your immune system.