In the wake of Google’s revelation that non-Gmail users who email Gmail users have “no legitimate expectation of privacy,” many Internet users wonder what else the search engine giant has in store for them. Well, they don’t have the wonder much longer. Apparently, Google has already begun creating new Internet tracking methods that do not rely on cookies. Cookies, which are small pieces of data sent from a website and stored in a web browser while the user is browsing that website, can often be turned off or blocked to varying degrees of success, for the sake of the user. However, blocking or turning off cookies inhibits advertisers or whomever is using the cookies from gathering or mining valuable data about the user that can be used to deliver tailored content to said user. As such, companies that use cookies have a valuable incentive to create new tracking technologies superior to today’s cookies. As such, it was only a matter of time before Google would develop new technology superior to today’s tracking technology.

Among the new concepts that Google is currently working on is ‘fingerprinting’ a device. By ‘fingerprinting’ a device, a unique identity or profile would be assigned to a device based on the characteristics of the device being used to access the website. Such characteristics would include anything from the size of the screen, software installed, time zone, fonts, and plugins installed, etc. Clearly, choices that you initially thought made you more socially unique (e.g. Opera as a browser, Path as an App) also make you more easily identifiable to advertisers.

The privacy implications are clear, as advertisers strive to deliver more tailored content to users, the privacy protection afforded to users becomes less of a concern. For more information on this topic, please visit our online privacy service page.

Sources: http://qz.com/125470/google-can-track-you-without-cookies/ http://techland.time.com/2013/08/14/google-says-gmail-users-have-no-legitimate-expectation-of-privacy/

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