Ad industry offers tracking opt out choice for consumers

May 2, 2014 | Online advertising, Regulation

The Digital Advertising Alliance is planning to offer a single-click “browser choice” option for consumers to opt out of some data tracking online, according to a news report. According to AdWeek the Digital Advertising Alliance will soon unveil a ‘Do Not Track’ solution that will be called “browser choice.” The article says, “The final product […]

The Digital Advertising Alliance is planning to offer a single-click “browser choice” option for consumers to opt out of some data tracking online, according to a news report.


According to AdWeek the Digital Advertising Alliance will soon unveil a ‘Do Not Track’ solution that will be called “browser choice.”
The article says, “The final product will include some of the same hallmarks of the DAA’s ad choices self-regulatory program, which allows consumers to opt-out of online behaviorally-targeted advertising by clicking on a little blue icon that appears on ads.”
Specifics of how “browser choice” will work have yet to be revealed. However it won’t affect first-party publishers (e.g., the New York Times); it will be directed toward third-party networks and data collection.
The DAA’s solution is separate from a “Do Not Track” initiative by the World Wide Web Consortium and doesn’t go as far as Microsoft’s version, which blocks tracking by default.
“For the Internet to function, there still has to be some data collection,” DAA lawyer Stu Ingis says.