Google AdSense and Cookies (Cookie Law) email

EU Cookies

[Badger37]

Hi all,
I've just received an email from Google regarding AdSense and Cookies.
Cookie Law came in a couple of years ago and seems mostly to be a waste or time and just another irritation to website visitors. I was hoping that it would quietly go away!

The email from Google reads as if you now have to implement a 'consent mechanism' if you have already - are other people receiving these emails and what are peoples views (especially if they are in the UK like me).

I've put the Google email text below.
Thanks.



Google Ads Policy Team
Dear Publisher,

We want to let you know about a new policy about obtaining EU end-users’ consent that reflects regulatory and best practice guidance. It clarifies your duty to obtain end-user consent when you use products like Google AdSense, DoubleClick for Publishers and DoubleClick Ad Exchange.

Please review our new EU user consent policy as soon as possible. This requires that you obtain EU end users’ consent to the storing and accessing of cookies and other information, and to the data collection, sharing and usage that takes place when you use Google products. It does not affect any provisions on data ownership in your contract.

Please ensure that you comply with this policy as soon as possible, and not later than 30 September 2015.

If your site or app does not have a compliant consent mechanism, you should implement one now. To make this process easier for you, we have compiled some helpful resources at cookiechoices.org.

This policy change is being made in response to best practice and regulatory requirements issued by the European data protection authorities. These requirements are reflected in changes that have been recently made on Google’s own websites.
Thank you in advance for your understanding and cooperation.
Regards,
The Google Policy Team

[Leosghost]

@ember
I always read threads from the beginning, as as they grow longer, I remember what I've read before..( and I really don't have much free time too, but I read real fast..) I'm just trying to avoid people thinking that it is applicable EU website owners only..I would n't want anyone here ( including you* : ) to lose their accounts because they did think that it doesn't apply to them..

*That is a lot to handle, you have my sympathies, I've been there ( all except for the running a "trust" part, and I work for myself..
kids and parents can be very very demanding..Mme leosghost looks after Alzheimers patients in their own homes as her job nowadays, I do a lot of free stuff for them errands and repairs and such..but I'm mostly nocturnal ;) I get by on around 5 or 6 hours sleep a night, except on the weekends.. so I read here , and code etc mostly at night..fewer distractions..I'm sorry if it came across a bit harsh..I was in a "difficult thread" at the same time as I posted in this one..some irritation spilled over..mea culpa.

[MrSavage]

Am I the only one who is finding the path of least resistance to this compliance is just by removing adsense from a site? In some instances, based on earnings potential, removing the ads all together seems like killing two birds with one stone. Has this been a consideration for anyone else? I'm not talking about reasonable earning sites, but certainly I have some sites that are deadsville in terms of adsense revenue generation.

[screamingmidget]

Am I the only one who is finding the path of least resistance to this compliance is just by removing adsense from a site?

I'd say that's obviously only down to people who make pennies. Many of us are not in that boat though and make a decent income, hence the thread.

[jpch]

Am I the only one who is finding the path of least resistance to this compliance is just by removing Adsense from a site?

Not at all as that's exactly what I did with an old site that was getting less than 1000 page views/day and making less than $8/day from AdSense. While I relaize that could be a significant amount for some people you have to realize this site was built with something other than WordPress and to update everything site wide requires me updating every single page with new code. I've slowly been killing this site off over the years anyway and moving content to new site so the cookie law was kind of the final blow to any attempt I was making at maintaining it. I replaced the AdSense ads on the few remaining pages with some affiliate ads that shouldn't require updating for quite some time so it will still generate some revenue.

[Badger37]

@darthtoon
Curious to know if anyone who's tried it already has noticed much of an impact on their Adsense CTR?

I'm happy to say it doesn't seem to have had any impact on my sites :)

Like many, my earnings are 'up and down' - but adding this banner hasn't hurt me, I'm actually having a better month so far...

[screamingmidget]

Badger37 without trawling through the previous pages, what method have you gone with?

[Ironside]

Is this what they are talking about

[demo.web357.eu...]

[Leosghost]

No..that is talking about the EU webmaster's version for joomla.. Google now says all adense publishers ( wherever they are based in the world ) must give a "cookie notice"..see netmeg's post #4769257 for details..

[Ironside]

I am still completely at a loss, as somebody got a demo available so I can see something working. If I can see what people are talking about it will be easier to implement.

[Badger37]

@screamingmidge
Badger37 without trawling through the previous pages, what method have you gone with?

On one site I'm using a tweaked version of SilkTide's script.
Messed with the CSS to fit my site and it also closes automatically if the visitor browses to another page.

On another site I'm using a 'hide div' script rather than something originally written for cookies - details posted earlier if you are interested.
This script gives much more control and is simple to implement - and works nicer with very old pages (running in quirksmode).

[robzilla]

With the deadline fast approaching, I put up the cookie bars today (made a simple one myself). It's pretty pointless in that they don't actually block any cookies until consent is given, it's just a bar fixed to the bottom of the screen that informs users cookies are being used and points to a privacy policy, and the bar only disappears (by cookie, of course) when "OK" is clicked. Technically it's not precisely what Google seems to be asking for, but blocking all cookies on first pageview will surely cut a fair chunk out of my revenue. I have yet to geotarget it, still deciding whether it's worth introducing a GeoIP solution just for the cookie bar.

I know a few EU webmasters who seem to be ignoring the whole thing. Which reminds me that there are also plenty websites running AdSense without a (required) privacy policy. Has anyone ever been booted or warned for that?

[vegasrick]

Does anyone here use anything outside of Adsense? I use numerous networks, some that blow Adsense away. But from browsing around the forums it appears the other ad network sections are practically a dead zone in terms of conversation.

[Leosghost]

Has anyone ever been booted or warned for that?

Some used to post here about it when stuff like that happened to them..nowadays far fewer people post here anyway..

" If a tree falls in the forest, and there is no-one there to hear it, does it make a sound? "

Does anyone here use anything outside of Adsense? I use numerous networks, some that blow Adsense away. But from browsing around the forums it appears the other ad network sections are practically a dead zone in terms of conversation.

the other networks are usually much harder to get into than adsense ( at non premium level ) ..adsense is just copy and paste code..we who are running adsense ( and maybe other networks ) are in adsense along with "the world and their dog"..so this section gets waaaaay more posts..

[ember]

And all the thousands of little mom and pop Adsense sites that do not read forums or the Adsense blog have no idea that this is coming this week. That really is not fair.

[Leosghost]

I agree..it "really is not fair"..
But..when did Google ever do "fair"..we can lose an account because someone decides to "click bomb" us..and we don't know that they did, we could be ill, in hospital, on vacation, anything..so not be aware they were "click bombing" us..
It is the fastest way to kill an enemy's or a competitors adsense account..
( which is why some of us do not put any of our accounts in our profiles here, or mention them anywhere on or offline )

But Google still kill adsense accounts of those who have been click bombed through no fault of their own..

( I'm not saying at all that I agree with Google's actions, there, as on many things that they do, I think they are wrong )

They say that it is all publishers responsibility to keep up to date with adsense TOS..and I think ( can't find a link ATM ) that we should all read their blog so as to keep up to date with their policies..

If they take action against any publishers ( who do not implement their "Google EU cookie notification policy" ) over this, I will think and say that they are wrong to do so..But..Google don' t care what I think..They don't care what any of us adsense publishers think, they don't care what adwords advertisers think, and from what I see they don't care about their users any more, just how much they can fool them and track them, they don't care about copyrights,( except their own ) they don't care about webmasters..and if they have levers ( such as search histories ) of politicians to influence laws and their application..then they don't care about laws..

They now consider themselves to be the "Uber race"..who know what is best for everyone, and especially best for Google..

[vegasrick]

Correction, I know a lot of big websites with a lot of traffic who have zero clue on what's coming. Every guy I've spoken to has not heard about this and really didn't care about looking into it either.

I get close to 4 million uniques per month and make a small fortune with Adsense. If not for this thread, I personally would have never known about this. I actually spoke with an Adsense rep on an unrelated matter the other day, when they reached out to give me optimization ideas. He never brought up a single mention of the EU topic and neither did I.

[Leosghost]

Correction

Correction to what / who ..?

[MrSavage]

I'm not sure if panic is setting in. This to me is a deadline, with an uncertain outcome with non compliance. Even as poor as the income has been, it's something I'm not willing to risk at this point. Anyone hitting panic mode yet?

[vegasrick]

Correction that only a lot of small websites don't know what's coming. A lot of large websites have no idea about this either. If I had to estimate, I would say more Adsense publishers are in the dark than those who know. For whatever reason, and what makes me think this is not as serious as we may think, is the fact they haven't mass mailed all the publishers about it. For them to selectively contact certain publishers means there is something here we all are missing. When Google had that Mobile deadline in April. I had three notifications from them - including two from Adsense. This EU issue - nothing.

[Leosghost]

Correction that only a lot of small websites don't know what's coming.

No one said the word "only"..so..there was nothing to "correct"..

Again the problem with Google is that they are never clear, they never tell the whole story..

Anyone hitting panic mode yet?

Apparently you are..try deep breathing in and out of a paper bag..it is good for calming panic attacks..

[ChanandlerBong]

knowing how much G love their data and testing, wouldn't be surprised if they've decided to do a big A/B test on this notification mailing. I'm sure whichever micro-department is responsible for this cookie thing can say right now something like "56% of EU sites we notified have so far added cookie notification code, 41% of non-EU sites have done likewise".

Why are they doing it like this? Well, it's a big risk. Revenue could certainly be hit. Why would they do that?

I already said above I would not be joining in this circus. The reason is, they've already demonstrated amply by targeted mailings of only some site owners that they're not really taking this seriously. Any US-based website with EU visitors (in other words, 99.99% of US sites) should have had this notification. If G isn't taking it seriously, why should I?

Can they throw someone out for not following a "rule" that others aren't following? That will be the key test. If you are expelled and mail them back with a list of 100 other adsense sites without cookie notification, what can they do? And anyway, I think the worst that will happen is they put a few accounts on 'pause' and sites like WebmasterWorld, sitepoint and ABW will echo loudly with webmaster cries and complaints long before they reach my little online abode.

so yes, that's the conclusion of my 2 months of musing about this thread.

Je ne fais rien - no hago nada - non faccio niente

[nomis5]

Apparently you are..try deep breathing in and out of a paper bag..it is good for calming panic attacks..

Just to put the record correct medically speaking ......

.....it can also cause severe problems (in extreme cases, a cessation of living) if you mistake a panic attack for an asthma attack.

AnAsthmatic who made that mistake!

[Ironside]

What about cookies for a community forum, i.e. remembering people's passwords and usernames?

It's strange that some people have received this message and others haven't. I've had absolutely no correspondence from Google telling me that I need to make these changes. Do Google honestly think that we are all telepathic? I don't see how they can expect you to carry out these changes if they haven't contacted you first. In normal circumstances if something is going to change, i.e. with your driving, or bills, you would be contacted and told exactly what's happening.

[robzilla]

What about cookies for a community forum, i.e. remembering people's passwords and usernames?

Those are so-called "functional" cookies, and don't require consent (but also have nothing to do with AdSense).

[RedBar]

@Ironside

Do your site actually set cookies or is it only AdSense you are concerned about?

[Ironside]

@Redbar I'm not sure about the cookie thing. The only element of my website that will use cookies is the password and username field. Because I've got a forum people have the ability to save their password. To be honest, I'm rather confused about the whole thing. I've always had a privacy policy on the website but I think I stated I don't deliberately use cookies. But then again, most of this has gone over my head and I don't really understand what they are wanting us to do. I never received any email from AdSense telling me what was needed. So I'm assuming that because they have written to me I am not required to have this new policy in situ. But I certainly don't want to fall foul of the rules and get myself in trouble.

I did post a link in a previous message asking about a specific module/plug-in that I can get for my Joomla! website. It seemed to resemble what people are talking about, it displays a message when you open the website telling people about the cookies. Here is the link again

[demo.web357.eu...]

[Badger37]

@Ironside
I'm not sure about the cookie thing...

Take a look at AdSense's blog entry that I linked to on the first page of this thread :)
[adsense.blogspot.ie...]

If like me you aren't interested in the EU view on cookies just Google's as a UK AdSense publisher then don't worry about your forum cookies etc. - just do enough to satisfy Google and their third party cookies.

Sounds simple when you say it quickly :)

[Ironside]

I probably sound like a complete idiot, but I don't understand why the EU has got everything to do with this. I'm not a computer geek, however as far as I know cookies remember people's information if they visit your website. I've not implemented any settings on my website that intend on remembering people's information. Having said that, my forum is like any other forum, it will remember your password and username if you ask it to. So I'm assuming that there is a cookie involved in this process?

I have a couple of other websites that have AdSense on them, but they are just informational type websites that don't involve user interaction. The main website that earns AdSense revenue as a.com/US based website, although I am in the UK. So obviously I am using Google.co.uk to provide me with my AdSense. I'm sorry if I sound a little bit clueless at the moment but I'm just not sure whether the cookie thing affects me or not. By the way, I get visitors from all over the world, including many countries in Europe.

[EmptyRoom]

Everyone's mentioning the Evictus code... where can I find it?

[ken_b]

Everyone's mentioning the Evictus code... where can I find it?

He posted it at github, here's a link.

[github.com...]
.