What happens after 3rd-party cookies go?

[bgweb]

Google recently announced that Chrome will start blocking 3rd-party cookies within 2 years. Some other browsers (I think Safari and Firefox) are starting to block them by default, therefore in my opinion they could stop being viable quite soon.

What do you think will happen to web advertising when when / if this happens? Will more advertising spend end-up in the walled gardens where tracking will still be possible? In turn will that have a negative impact on the open web or lead to the search for alternative funding methods?

[levo]

Depends on the website. If you have a specialized website, Google will already know the visitor's interest and the ads will be related to the content & website. Just like it used to in the beginning.

If it's a generic website or a page - for example, a NYTimes story on politics - it might not get high-paying ads the user has an interest in.

[tangor]

Related, but not exactly the same thing ...

Ad blockers and script blockers have been around for over a decade so those users will not be affected one way or the other (they already block third party).

As levo notes above, I suspect the biggest change will be on g's side as they give up a bunch of tracking and get back to the real side of advertising: matching ads to content.

[Dimitri]

What happens after 3rd-party cookies go?

The end of times... the collapse of the society, the return to the prehistoric era, ... like the Year 2000 bug.

That being said, when Google makes this move, this is because they have alternatives ready. So, it might really be a hard time for other, smaller ad networks, which might not be able to develop alternative technologies. Beside getting ride of concurrence, certainly that Google knows how to improve its profits from this. Advertisers, might have to spend their budget in a different way, and I am sure that this different way, will be more expensive ...

[edited by: Dimitri at 12:59 pm (utc) on Feb 25, 2020]

[iamlost]

There is little, in our web-verse, funnier than Google hyping increased privacy when they can track Chrome browser (v54+ aka since October 2016) users with almost 100% accuracy.

They don’t need no stinking cookies. Which is probably why all the long drawn out hype of cookie distraction.

Note: as it’s gone GitHub public if not really much elsewhere this particular ID factor (x-client-data in header) may be quietly ‘withdrawn’.

Which would be disappointing as I’ve been using it for fingerprinting since v57, March 2017... ah well, I’m sure there is, will be another quiet flag just waiting to whisper hi it’s me... the game’s afoot! again.

[ember]

If you have a specialized website, Google will already know the visitor's interest and the ads will be related to the content & website. Just like it used to in the beginning.

Yes!

[Kendo]

They don’t need no stinking cookies.

It is not difficult to get device serial numbers and post them back home encrypted/disguised as a session ID. Who would be the wiser?

How would their users feel about that?

[thedonald123]

It's difficult, almost impossible, to imagine advertisers who are currently using targeting to roll back 10 years and start using only contextual ads. Not when they can continue targeting their ads to individual users on Facebook, Google, Pinterest etc.

Smaller websites with a very specific niche, who are currently getting mostly contextual ads have less to worry about. But, if you're getting mostly targeted ads now ...it's a troublesome future.

See:
Effect of disabling third-party cookies on publisher revenue [services.google.com...]

Will affiliate websites be affected? What about linking to Amazon products?

[bgweb]

@thedonald123: I think you've highlighted the key concerns for publishers:

1) It's difficult to imagine a wholesale shift back to contextual ads
2) Some advertising spend may well transfer to Facebook, Google logins etc

[JS_Harris]

I know of one major company who is going to call this an upstream issue when suddenly their cookie based affiliate tracking method stops working. Their solution has always been to offer random "makegoods" loosely based on what they think the affiliate is worth.

I hope I'm wrong but my point is - we've all got sufficient warning to adjust as needed. No pitty(or mercy) for those who don't adapt.