Google to develop ‘FLoC’ systems which prevent individual tracking

Google Inc., in a move to protect the data and privacy of its users, said it will not develop personal identifiers, in conformity with its previous decision to slowly stop the use of third-party cookies which was taken a year ago.

The company has decided to start shifting towards the use of Application Programming Interfaces that provide multiples layers of security to users and prevent individual tracking.

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Previously in 2020, Google had started developing an online advertising tool called Federated Learning of Cohorts (FLoC) which instead of making use of individual identifiers, employs “advances in aggregation, anonymization, on-device processing and other privacy-preserving technologies” to borrow data from large groups with common interests.

David Temkin, Director of Product Management, Ads Privacy and Trust at Google stated, “People shouldn’t have to accept being tracked across the web to get the benefits of relevant advertising. Advertisers don’t need to track individuals across the web to get the performance benefits of digital advertising.”

Going into details of the ‘FLoC’ tools he said, “Chrome intends to make FLoC-based cohorts available for public testing through origin trials with its next release this month and we expect to begin testing FLoC-based cohorts with advertisers in Google Ads in Q2. Chrome will offer the first iteration of new user controls in April and will expand on controls later as more proposals reach the origin trial stage and they receive more feedback.”