Microsoft’s ‘Tracking Protection’ standard submission accepted by W3C

[ChromeFoundry]

The Internet Explorer team has http://blogs.msdn.com/b/ie/archive/2011/02/24/web-tracking-protection-an-emerging-internet-standard-that-helps-protect-consumers-from-tracking.aspx">something to brag about: its submission to the W3C for ‘http://www.w3.org/Submission/2011/01/Comment/">Tracking Submission‘ has been accepted.

Tracking Protection, an important component of the upcoming version of Internet Explorer, IE9, is now “an Internet Standard to help protect consumer privacy.” In the blog post on the matter, Microsoft called for the same type of collaboration that has been demonstrated with HTML5 to be applied to protecting consumer privacy online.

According to Dean Hachamovitch, Microsoft’s Vice President for Internet Explorer:

“Consumers and governments around the world have signaled that they are deeply concerned about their privacy online. As part of Microsoft’s continuing commitment to online privacy, the company delivered Tracking Protection in IE9 RC earlier this month, a feature that enables users to opt-out of online tracking or block content that does the tracking.

Microsoft’s privacy submission to the W3C ensures that Tracking Protection is fully interoperable and can be used universally. Microsoft believes that all customers should have the opportunity to control their online experience.”

Source: http://thenextweb.com/microsoft/2011/02/24/microsofts-tracking-protection-accepted-by-w3c-as-internet-standard/

[wtmusic]

1. "If a website detects that this preference is enabled,

it must disable any tracking code or collection of data that can be used for tracking purposes."

Or Bill Gates is gonna come over and spank me?

[Cronus Protagonist]

2. Or their web site will show warnings and error messages to the user

via the browser. Simple.

[wtmusic]

4. Every site using Google Analytics would throw an error

which, if I remember a previous post of CF's correctly, would be 40-60% of the sites online.

Not to mention any site which uses external JS libraries or TypeKit fonts.

[ChromeFoundry]

5. The proposed W3C standard states

that Google Analytics would be required to disable any tracking if you had the option enabled.

Just for clarification:
Bill Gates would not spank you.
The W3C would spank Google if Google did not comply with the standard. As well as any other advertiser using tracking images, tracking cookies and Flash cookies.

[wtmusic]

6. Not sure how they intend to ID "tracking cookies"

or how they expect any significant number of internet users to enable this feature when most never disable cookies now. Seems there are already any number of ways to effectively circumvent it, and it will be perceived as a hassle in a browser which is already a monumental pain in the ass.

As for the W3C, they're not in a position to spank anyone. W3C compliance has been ignored when new features are at stake, and Microsoft has traditionally been the first to ignore them - to the point of deception (MS's spoofing of USER AGENT to grab Netscape market share way back when through Silverlight/HTML5).

All in favor of privacy, but this won't deliver it. Slick marketing.

[ChromeFoundry]

7. No, I don't think this is a "solution" to the problem...

but it is a motion in the right direction. But, I applaud any company that is making an effort to give internet users the freedom to choose what they want to share.

Even if this proves to be a marketing tactic for Microsoft... I'm sure the Open Source community will expand on the standard and hopefully we will reach a point where the market demands more from the corporations.

[OhioChick]

3. This is a first small step for user privacy n/t