3rd-party Cookies

Have you ever downloaded the data Facebook has on you? Or Google? The sheer breadth of data collection has 86% of consumers worried, and this has led to a number of users leaving data-hungry social media platforms. It has also forced organizations like Google to do some soul-searching and adjust their approach to user data, notably by retiring third-party cookies.

In 2023 Google announced the depreciation of third-party cookies and began the development of the Google Privacy Sandbox. However, the deadline has once again been pushed back, this time to 2025]. The reason? “The need for more time to evaluate and test the new technologies.” Despite positive developments, RTB House’s own tests of the FLEDGE proposal, with nearly 8 million ads in 50 countries, have shown that there is still plenty of work to be done to build effective cookieless alternatives.

As a new year dawns, many of us are looking toward 2023 with trepidation. A potent cocktail of skyrocketing inflation, a looming recession, and general global instability has created a difficult environment for companies in almost every industry. However, things aren’t as bad as they seem, and if companies can take advantage of the evolving MarTech trends, they can thrive despite the adversity.

It might have been delayed, but the end of third-party tracking cookies is coming at the beginning of 2025, and businesses can’t afford to keep pretending otherwise. The good news is that thanks to this delay, there is still a small window of opportunity for companies to prepare for the cookieless future by engaging with the Google Chrome Privacy Sandbox.

Google has released an article announcing the availability of Bidding and Auction services in the web version of FLEDGE, as well as the status on pending FLEDGE capabilities. These two Google releases could have a major impact on the adoption of FLEDGE in the near future.

Have you heard of Seller-Defined Audiences (SDA) yet? SDA was released at the beginning of 2022 by Project Rearc – an initiative that came to life as the IAB Tech Lab’s answer to the impending demise of 3rd-party cookies. Although a year hasn’t passed since its release, SDA has received significant attention in the press and industry conferences and is considered one of the go-to solutions for targeting when the 3rd-party cookie pond dries up.