Google Chrome is personalizing ads based on your browsing history. Users have started receiving notifications telling them about the new feature. The tech giant claims this will enhance user experience by making ads more relevant.
“We’re launching new privacy features that give you more choice over the ads you see. Chrome notes topics of interest based on your recent browsing history. Also, sites you visit can determine what you like,” the notification reads.
The feature was included in Chrome version 115 — released in July — and has been slowly rolled out. Privacy-conscious users have criticized the new feature on social media, describing it as a potential violation of privacy.
One user went so far as to describe Google Chrome as “spyware.”
This ad-targeting is part of Google’s Topics API within its Privacy Sandbox project. Google will collect topics of interest from users’ most recent weeks of browsing history and share this data with sites that request it. When users visit these sites on Chrome, the ads they see will be personalized based on this data.
Google only shares up to three topics and deletes any topic older than four weeks from the list, MSPoweruser reported.
Potential Misuse of Data, Lack of an Opt-Out Option
Despite the tech giant’s assurances of data protection, several experts find this ad-targeting problematic. They argue that Google is not being completely transparent about how it gathers, uses, and stores data — these concerns persist even though Google has promised to phase out third-party cookies by 2024, a move the company has been pondering since 2020.
Google’s Topics API suite is a replacement for the now-defunct Federated Learning of Cohorts (FLoC). FLoC was Google’s ambitious attempt to transform internet advertising by phasing out third-party cookies.
One of the biggest criticisms of Google’s new ad-targeting feature is the absence of an easy opt-out button. Under the new notification on Chrome, users can either click “Settings” to change their ad privacy on the browser or click “Got it” to accept the new feature.
“I really hate this “Got it” form of @darkpatterns for deciding what users want,” a security researcher said on X.
Critics have also raised concerns that this invasive data collection may open the way to mass surveillance and potential manipulation. These fears are pushing some users towards more privacy-friendly browsers like DuckDuckGo and Brave.
How to Stop Ad-Targeting on Chrome
Follow the steps below to stop Google from sharing your data with websites to deliver targeted ads:
- Go to Settings by clicking on the three dots at the top of your Chrome window.
- Click on “Privacy and security” in the left-hand side menu.
- Select “Ad privacy” and toggle off the top setting.
While this will prevent Google from personalizing ads based on your browsing history, it does not address other tracking methods like cookies, tracking pixels, or even keystroke recording that some websites might use.
To learn more about how to limit the data you share with Chrome, check out our guide to optimizing your Chrome privacy settings.
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