LONDON (AP) — Google is providing U.Okay. regulators a job overseeing its phasing out of ad-tracking expertise from its Chrome browser, in a bundle of commitments the tech large is proposing to use globally to go off a contest investigation.
The U.Okay. competitors watchdog has been investigating Google’s proposals to take away so-called third-party cookies over issues they might undermine digital advert competitors and entrench the corporate’s market energy.
To deal with the issues, Google on Friday provided a set of commitments together with giving the Competitors and Markets Authority an oversight function as the corporate designs and develops a alternative expertise.
“The emergence of tech giants akin to Google has offered competitors authorities all over the world with new challenges that require a brand new method,” Andrea Coscelli, the watchdog’s chief government, stated.
Google’s promises also include “substantial limits” on how Google will use and combine individual user data for digital ad purposes and a pledge not to discriminate against rivals in favor of its own ad businesses with the new technology.
If Google’s commitments are accepted, they will be applied globally, the company said in a blog post.
Third-party cookies – snippets of code that log user info – are used to help businesses more effectively target advertising and fund free online content such as newspapers. However, they’ve also been a longstanding source of privacy concerns because they can be used to track users across the internet.
Google shook up the digital ad industry with its plan to do away with third-party cookies, which raised fears newer technology would leave even less room for online ad rivals. The plan involves replacing “individual identifiers” with techniques that hide users in large online groups based on their interests while keeping web browsing histories on devices to maintain privacy.
The competition watchdog will seek feedback until July from other players in the tech and digital ad industry on Google’s commitments. Then it will decide whether to accept Google’s offer and close the competition case.
Google has been busy grappling with a wave tide of antitrust investigations in Europe. The U.K. offer comes days after it resolved another case involving its digital ad business, when it agreed to pay a 220 million euro ($268 million) to France’s antitrust watchdog for abusing its ‘dominant’ position in online advertising.
___
For all of AP’s tech coverage, visit https://apnews.com/apf-technology
___
Follow Kelvin Chan at https://www.twitter.com/chanman