Category Archives: Google

FILE PHOTO: The brand logo of Alphabet Inc's Google is seen outside its office in Beijing, China August 8, 2018. Picture taken with a fisheye lens. REUTERS/Thomas Peter

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Department of Justice accused Google of dragging its feet in providing documents in preparation for a trial on allegations that it broke antitrust law while the search and advertising giant said the government was being unreasonable.

In a joint filing late Thursday, the Justice Department said that Alphabets Google had balked at some search terms that the government wanted it to use to locate relevant documents. The Justice Department estimated the request to Google would produce 4.85 million documents.

It also said that Google had refused to agree to dozens of additional custodians, essentially people whose emails and other documents would be searched as part of pre-trial document production.

Google, for its part, said that they had reviewed more than 12 million documents for the governments case, and expressed concern at the growing number of custodians whose documents were sought.

The DOJ Plaintiffs proposal is unreasonable and not proportional to the needs of this case, Google said in the filing.

The cases under discussion are the federal government and one of the state lawsuits against Google. Those actions are two of the five antitrust lawsuits filed against Big Tech last year.

Reporting by Diane Bartz; Editing by Marguerita Choy

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U.S. DOJ accuses Google of dragging its feet in antitrust trial - Reuters

Googles 210 N. Carpenter St. Office in Chicago. | Photo: Google

Googleisnt just one of thelargest tech companies in the Bay Area, its one of the worldslargest companies in general. But thats not stopping it from getting even bigger.

On Thursday, Google announced its major U.S. expansion plans for the year of 2021. This involves investing more than $7 billion into its offices and data centers across 19 states. Its also planning to create at least10,000 new full-time Google jobs this year in the U.S. alone. Even for a company withover 135,000 employees, thats an impressive number of full-time jobs to add in one year.

Part of this expansion includes growth in Chicago. According to the announcement, Google is adding thousands of new roles across four U.S. cities: Chicago, New York, Atlanta and Washington, D.C.

While Google didnt reveal a specific number for how many Chicago jobs its adding, this follows an earlier pledge from last yearto add more jobs in Chicago. These jobs will be based out of Googles Fulton Market campus and its newer space at 210 N Carpenter Street, which opened in late 2019.

More Chicago tech newsTripscout Raises $2.3M in Anticipation of a Post-Pandemic Boom

According to a news release, Google will be investing $25 million into the state of Illinois this year. Google has 1,400 employees in Illinois, with most of them based in Chicago.

In the announcement, Google also detailed how its also investing in various social causes. Tech hub cities in the U.S. often have higher costs of living, which holds true for Googles hometown of Mountain View in the SF Bay Area. For that reason, Google is committing$1 billiontowards affordable housing initiatives in the Bay Area.

Weve been proud to call Chicago home for more than 20 years and we want to be able to look back 20 years from now and see that weve had even more impact, Karen Sauder, site lead and VP in the Chicago office, said in a statement.In 2021, were prioritizing diversity in hiring and looking for the ways we can support more economic equality in our city through new jobs, investments in the community, and other programs were offering small businesses.

Google says that 2020 was its biggest year for hiringBlack and Latinx employees in the U.S. The company will alsocontinue to givefinancial support to racial justice organization and Black-owned businesses.

Because of Googles size, its hiring and overall business decisions have a significant economic impact for the country, and in the communities its part of. For example, Googles services brought$426 billion of economic activity to over 2 million American businesses, according to Googles new2020 U.S. Economic Impact Report. Google hopes that its10,000 new jobs will bring high-paying salaries to communities across the U.S., and help the country recover from a year of economic hardship.

Economic recovery starts with lifting up our small businesses and prioritizing equity in hiring, so Im thrilled that Google will invest $25 million in Illinois' post-pandemic recovery, IllinoisGovernor JB Pritzker said in a statement. This critical investment will help us revive our economy creating jobs and expanding access to prosperity for all of our residents.

Also in ChicagoReverb Sees Huge Q4 Growth for Its Music Gear Marketplace

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Google Is Adding Thousands of Chicago Jobs as Part of Its 2021 U.S. Expansion - Built In Chicago

Democratic Sen. Richard Blumenthal said Congress needs to bolster the FTC, which needs to be given adequate resources to go toe-to-toe with such a deep-pocketed industry.

Enforcers need both the will and the tools to take on Big Tech, the Connecticut lawmaker, who sits on the Senate Judiciary antitrust subcommittee, said in a statement. If the FTC isnt willing to bring cases against Big Tech, we need reforms that make sure that consumers, workers, and small businesses harmed by abuses of monopoly power can seek recourse in the courts.

The sharp reactions highlight how much the reputation of Silicon Valleys biggest companies has suffered in Washington since a decade ago, when lawmakers on both sides of the aisle tended to embrace them as economic engines. Now Apple, Amazon, Facebook and Google are facing all kinds of scrutiny, including FTC and Justice Department antitrust investigations and calls by both Republicans and Democrats to hold online companies liable for content their users post.

POLITICO obtained 312 pages of internal FTC documents that lay out what the agencys attorneys and economists thought of allegations that the search giant demoted rivals like Yelp and eBay to boost its own niche products. Those include both some incorrect or contradictory assumptions about the future of the internet and concerns about Googles contracts to set its search engine as the default on most mobile devices exclusive agreements with Apple, wireless carriers and smartphone makers that are now the subject of a Justice Department antitrust suit.

At least one Democrat saw promising signs in the FTCs current acting chief, Rebecca Kelly Slaughter, who will testify on Thursday in the House about antitrust issues. The good news is, Becca Slaughter is taking these issues seriously, said Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.), who chairs the House Energy and Commerce subcommittee overseeing the FTC. Schakowsky declined to comment directly on the FTCs 2011-13 probe.

The FTC didnt respond to requests for comment.

Other Republicans piled on with Buck. Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.), a frequent tech critic, said the documents indicate that the Obama administration gave Google a sweetheart deal and called for the Senate Judiciary Committee to hold hearings.

Google got away with breaking the law last time, said Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.), a fellow tech critic on the Judiciary panel. This time, Google is fighting three different antitrust lawsuits and facing off against the Justice Department and almost every state attorney general in the country.

They were in rare alliance with progressive activists, who seized on the revelations to call the government out for missing a chance to regulate Google at a time when it may have been easier to put growing Silicon Valley companies in check.

Zephyr Teachout, a Fordham Law professor and anti-monopoly advocate, said on Twitter that the full 312 pages of documents from the investigation showed that the FTCs Obama-era probe was so much worse than we thought. And we thought it was bad.

This is a devastating takedown of Obama FTC and FTC economists, she wrote.

Google had a much different take on the documents obtained by POLITICO, saying they showed that the agency recognized how the companys search engine benefits users. Google also took aim at Microsoft, one of the companies that complained to the FTC about Googles conduct.

The FTC put consumers' interests in higher-quality search results over the interests of a powerful commercial rival, which has since grown even further, to become the second-biggest company in the U.S. by market capitalization, said Rosie Lipscomb, Googles director of competition, in a blog post Tuesday. Microsoft declined to comment.

Other corporate adversaries of Google pushed back quickly. Yelp CEO Jeremy Stoppelman whose company was among those that complained to the FTC in the earlier probe also urged Congress to hold a hearing.

Its now clearer than ever that the decision to close the antitrust investigation against Google in 2013 has not aged well, he said. These smoking gun docs show how Google methodically destroyed the web. All this evidence should be revisited with fresh eyes.

But even some of the tech industrys critics said laying the blame on the FTC ignores a bigger barrier to antitrust actions: judges hostile to such cases. Harold Feld, a senior vice president at open internet nonprofit Public Knowledge, said recent examples include the Justice Departments unsuccessful challenge to the AT&T-Time Warner merger in 2018 and state attorneys general who failed to block the merger of Sprint and T-Mobile deal last year.

It won't matter how aggressive the DOJ and FTC are if the current judiciary continue to undermine antitrust in the name of phantom efficiencies, said Feld, whose group accepts some donations from Google.

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Google revelations trigger swift bipartisan call for action - POLITICO

Bloomberg

(Bloomberg) -- Wall Street hasnt been this bullish about lithium in years.Investors are betting on a comeback in the metal key to rechargeable batteries as the worlds biggest automakers ratchet up their electric-vehicle lines. Miners once shunned amid supply overhangs have raised almost $3.4 billion in equity offerings in the Americas this year, data compiled by Bloomberg show. Thats seven times the total amount raised from 2018 to 2020.The change breathes new life into an industry that saw prices of its main product plunge by more than half from a record high reached in 2018. It also highlights a bullish wager thats still available on the EV frenzy as sentiment toward electric-vehicle stocks, which surged last year, sours.Talks with investors and discussions on potential supply agreements with automotive-equipment and battery manufacturers which were only in my dreams a year ago are now filling my calendar, Robert Mintak, chief executive officer of Vancouver-based Standard Lithium Ltd., said by phone.Interest in the industry is resurgent as electric-vehicle targets set by big automakers and a change in the U.S. administration signal that a battery boom is finally gathering momentum. After the punishing three-year sell-off, prices of the soft silvery-white metal have started to rebound, and analysts including those at BloombergNEF expect further gains on rising demand and tight supplies of battery-grade lithium.A lithium price index compiled by Benchmark Mineral Intelligence jumped 32% this year through February, after plunging 59% from mid-2018 to mid-2020. The metal reached an all-time high in May 2018.Bigger PoolThe investor pool is expanded to technology investors and others, said Mintak, as major automakers determination to deploy hundreds of billions of dollars to electrify their fleets gives investors that safety that theres going to be a supply pinch.The majority of the financing has been done by the worlds top two lithium miners -- Albemarle Corp. and SQM, or Soc. Quimica & Minera de Chile SA, as its known formally -- as they took advantage of their recent stock surges. Albemarle completed a larger-than-planned equity offering of $1.5 billion in early February, while Santiago-based SQM raised $1.1 billion in January.Junior miners, most of which have yet to produce substantial amount of lithium, are also attracting strong interest from investors. Take the case of Standard Lithium, which opened its first direct lithium extraction plant in El Dorado, Arkansas, in September, with the facility using a new technology that allows for a 90% lithium recovery rate. It raised C$34.53 million ($27.6 million) in an over-subscribed share offering in December. Investor interest was so strong that it had to turn away offers for more, said CEO Mintak.Lithium Americas Corp., which is developing the Thacker Pass mine in Nevada, raised a total of $500 million through two primary share offerings in October and January, respectively.Turning TideThe tide is finally turning, and much faster than I thought, Chris Berry, president of House Mountain Partners, an industry consultant, who said Wall Street hasnt been this bullish on the lithium industry since 2017. You see that with Lithium Americas being able to raise a total of half a billion dollars recently. This is for a pre-revenue company regarding lithium.Sigma Lithium Resources Corp., which is developing a hard-rock lithium project in Brazil, had to upsize its private placement and increase offering price, which says a lot about investor demand for lithium exposure, that asset, and that companys vision, said Berry.Junior lithium miners raised $529 million this year, Bloomberg data showed. Thats about $63 million more than the total amount raised from 2018 to 2020.Ford Motor Co. announced last month that its passenger-vehicle range will be all-electric in Europe by 2030. General Motors Co. plans to sell only zero-emission models by 2035. Volkswagen AG went further, announcing plans this week to build six battery factories in Europe and invest globally in charging stations, as ensuring scaling battery production has become a key in the EV race.Batteries make up about 30% of an electric cars cost. And automakers around the world look to pivot to EVs, with hopes to get batteries at the cheapest price possible but also secure enough supply to meet those ambitions.Meanwhile, U.S. President Joe Biden has pledged to build back the economy after the devastation of Covid-19 with cleaner energy and a lower carbon footprint. The administration said in late February it would conduct a government review of U.S. supply chains to seek to end the countrys reliance on China and other adversaries for crucial goods.The election of Biden is a very favorable signal to investors as it boosted confidence that the switch to clean energy will accelerate, which along with existing favorable subsidies and regulations in Europe and China bodes well for raw materials needed for that energy transition, said Seth Goldstein, an analyst at Morningstar Inc. The U.S. is the second-largest EV market, after China.Andrew Bowering, a director at Vancouver-based American Lithium Corp., called the U.S. review on supply chains huge for the lithium industry as it shows the governments realization that in order to meet clean-energy goals, its important for the U.S. to have a security of supply of raw materials such as lithium.All of a sudden, after three years of downturn, youve got the price of the commodity starting to go up again and a change in the administration in the U.S. thats pushing a green new deal and support big money going into the green automobile industry, said Bowering. That leads investors into the space.For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.2021 Bloomberg L.P.

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Google's Threadit is a short-form video platform for work - Yahoo Tech

Bloomberg

(Bloomberg) -- Wall Street hasnt been this bullish about lithium in years.Investors are betting on a comeback in the metal key to rechargeable batteries as the worlds biggest automakers ratchet up their electric-vehicle lines. Miners once shunned amid supply overhangs have raised almost $3.4 billion in equity offerings in the Americas this year, data compiled by Bloomberg show. Thats seven times the total amount raised from 2018 to 2020.The change breathes new life into an industry that saw prices of its main product plunge by more than half from a record high reached in 2018. It also highlights a bullish wager thats still available on the EV frenzy as sentiment toward electric-vehicle stocks, which surged last year, sours.Talks with investors and discussions on potential supply agreements with automotive-equipment and battery manufacturers which were only in my dreams a year ago are now filling my calendar, Robert Mintak, chief executive officer of Vancouver-based Standard Lithium Ltd., said by phone.Interest in the industry is resurgent as electric-vehicle targets set by big automakers and a change in the U.S. administration signal that a battery boom is finally gathering momentum. After the punishing three-year sell-off, prices of the soft silvery-white metal have started to rebound, and analysts including those at BloombergNEF expect further gains on rising demand and tight supplies of battery-grade lithium.A lithium price index compiled by Benchmark Mineral Intelligence jumped 32% this year through February, after plunging 59% from mid-2018 to mid-2020. The metal reached an all-time high in May 2018.Bigger PoolThe investor pool is expanded to technology investors and others, said Mintak, as major automakers determination to deploy hundreds of billions of dollars to electrify their fleets gives investors that safety that theres going to be a supply pinch.The majority of the financing has been done by the worlds top two lithium miners -- Albemarle Corp. and SQM, or Soc. Quimica & Minera de Chile SA, as its known formally -- as they took advantage of their recent stock surges. Albemarle completed a larger-than-planned equity offering of $1.5 billion in early February, while Santiago-based SQM raised $1.1 billion in January.Junior miners, most of which have yet to produce substantial amount of lithium, are also attracting strong interest from investors. Take the case of Standard Lithium, which opened its first direct lithium extraction plant in El Dorado, Arkansas, in September, with the facility using a new technology that allows for a 90% lithium recovery rate. It raised C$34.53 million ($27.6 million) in an over-subscribed share offering in December. Investor interest was so strong that it had to turn away offers for more, said CEO Mintak.Lithium Americas Corp., which is developing the Thacker Pass mine in Nevada, raised a total of $500 million through two primary share offerings in October and January, respectively.Turning TideThe tide is finally turning, and much faster than I thought, Chris Berry, president of House Mountain Partners, an industry consultant, who said Wall Street hasnt been this bullish on the lithium industry since 2017. You see that with Lithium Americas being able to raise a total of half a billion dollars recently. This is for a pre-revenue company regarding lithium.Sigma Lithium Resources Corp., which is developing a hard-rock lithium project in Brazil, had to upsize its private placement and increase offering price, which says a lot about investor demand for lithium exposure, that asset, and that companys vision, said Berry.Junior lithium miners raised $529 million this year, Bloomberg data showed. Thats about $63 million more than the total amount raised from 2018 to 2020.Ford Motor Co. announced last month that its passenger-vehicle range will be all-electric in Europe by 2030. General Motors Co. plans to sell only zero-emission models by 2035. Volkswagen AG went further, announcing plans this week to build six battery factories in Europe and invest globally in charging stations, as ensuring scaling battery production has become a key in the EV race.Batteries make up about 30% of an electric cars cost. And automakers around the world look to pivot to EVs, with hopes to get batteries at the cheapest price possible but also secure enough supply to meet those ambitions.Meanwhile, U.S. President Joe Biden has pledged to build back the economy after the devastation of Covid-19 with cleaner energy and a lower carbon footprint. The administration said in late February it would conduct a government review of U.S. supply chains to seek to end the countrys reliance on China and other adversaries for crucial goods.The election of Biden is a very favorable signal to investors as it boosted confidence that the switch to clean energy will accelerate, which along with existing favorable subsidies and regulations in Europe and China bodes well for raw materials needed for that energy transition, said Seth Goldstein, an analyst at Morningstar Inc. The U.S. is the second-largest EV market, after China.Andrew Bowering, a director at Vancouver-based American Lithium Corp., called the U.S. review on supply chains huge for the lithium industry as it shows the governments realization that in order to meet clean-energy goals, its important for the U.S. to have a security of supply of raw materials such as lithium.All of a sudden, after three years of downturn, youve got the price of the commodity starting to go up again and a change in the administration in the U.S. thats pushing a green new deal and support big money going into the green automobile industry, said Bowering. That leads investors into the space.For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.2021 Bloomberg L.P.

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Google antitrust lawsuit amended to target Chromes Privacy Sandbox - Yahoo Tech

Google Chromes Incognito Mode is at the forefront of a $5 billion class-action lawsuit which alleges users are being tracked during private browsing sessions.

The lawsuit alleges Google is in violation of wiretapping and privacy laws for intercepting, tracking, and collecting communications when Chromes Incognito mode is in use.

Google has been trying to get the lawsuit dismissed since it was filed last June. A federal judge ruled the lawsuit must go forward.

In the judges ruling its stated Google does not adequately inform users that their data can be collected in Incognito mode.

US District Judge Lucy Koh in San Jose, California, writes:

The court concludes that Google did not notify users that Google engages in the alleged data collection while the user is in private browsing mode.

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To be clear, the consumers who filed the case are taking issue with Google collecting data using other services while in Incognito mode.

For example, when a user visits a website in Incognito mode their data can still be collected by Google Analytics.

The consumers who filed the suit say they were under the impression Incognito mode offered all encompassing privacy from data trackers.

Google disputes the claims via a statement provided by company spokesperson Jose Castaneda:

We strongly dispute these claims and we will defend ourselves vigorously against them. Incognito mode in Chrome gives you the choice to browse the internet without your activity being saved to your browser or device. As we clearly state each time you open a new incognito tab, websites might be able to collect information about your browsing activity during your session.

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Google also notes that the plaintiffs agreed to Chromes privacy policy which discloses its data collection practices.

How clear does Google make it that users data can still be collected in Incognito mode? Lets take a look.

Consumers filed a class-action lawsuit against Google for collecting data while using Incognito mode in the Chrome browser.

The judge hearing the case ordered the lawsuit to go forward on the grounds that Google doesnt inform users their data can still be collected while they browse in Incognito mode.

Google disputes the claims, saying it does inform users every time they open an Incognito window that data may be collected by websites.

Heres what users see when they activate Incognito mode in the Chrome browser:

The message begins with the statement, Now you can browse privately and then goes on to clarify a users browsing activity is private from other people who use the same device.

Toward the bottom the message specifically states:

Your activity might still be visible to websites you visit.

The message also lets users know their activity could be visible to others while using Incognito mode at school or work.

A users internet service provider might be able to view their activity as well.

Google Chromes Incognito mode is widely misunderstood.

There are some who believe Incognito mode exempts a user from personalized search results. This was the focus of a study conducted by DuckDuckGo in 2018.

There are others, like the plaintiffs of this lawsuit, who believe Incognito mode offers absolute privacy.

What does it actually do?

Incognito mode prevents data from being stored locally. It hides a users browsing activity from other people who may use the same device.

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For example, if you share a computer with roommates, you can use Incognito mode to prevent them from seeing what websites you visit.

Thats the extent of what Incognito mode is designed for.

This will be an interesting case to follow, as the plaintiffs will have to convince a jury that their claims are valid.

If nothing else, this case may create greater awareness of Incognito mode does and doesnt do.

Source: Bloomberg

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Google to Face $5B Lawsuit Over Tracking Users in Incognito Mode - Search Engine Journal

Google Cloud, riding a digital transformation wave thats been accelerated by the coronavirus pandemic, continues to push out new products and services reflecting its multi-cloud and industry-specific strategy.

Recent new tools include bare metal and telecommunications industry-geared variations of its hybrid and multi-cloud Anthos platform that allows customers to build and manage applications across their on-premise data centers, Google Cloud Platform and competitors clouds. Google Cloud also continues to push out new database capabilities with Cloud SQL Insights and the serverless Database Migration Service announced in November.

The No. 3 cloud provider finished 2020 with $13.05 billion in cloud revenue from its Google Cloud Platform services and Google Workspace collaboration tools, representing 46.6 percent year-over-year. Its future contract backlog grew to $30 billion in the last quarter, up from $19 billion.

Heres a look at some of the hottest Google Cloud tools to watch in 2021.

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The 10 Hottest Google Cloud Tools To Watch In 2021 - CRN

California [US]: Tech giant Google recently revealed in a blog post that it blocked or removed 3.1 billion bad ads, including COVID-19 related advertisements, internationally in 2020 for violating its policies.

According to Mashable, the organisation has also limited an extra 6.4 billion advertisements.

"In 2020, our policies and enforcement were put to the test as we collectively navigated a global pandemic, multiple elections around the world and the continued fight against bad actors looking for new ways to take advantage of people online," said Scott Spencer, VP, ads privacy and safety, in a blog post.

He further added that "thousands of Googlers worked around the clock to deliver a safe experience for users, creators, publishers and advertisers. We know that when we make decisions through the lens of user safety, it will benefit the broader ecosystem. Preserving trust for advertisers and publishers helps their businesses succeed in the long term."

Mashable announced that Google has refreshed or added more than 40 arrangements for advertisers and publishers. Discussing Covid related advertisements, the tech giant restricted and blocked more than 99 million Covid-related promotions from serving consistently, including those for miracle cures, N95 masks due to supply shortages, as well as fake vaccine doses.

Notably, this is the main year that Google is sharing data on advertisement limitations which is a core part of its overall strategy. It says that confining advertisements permits the firm to tailor its methodology dependent on geography, local laws and our certification programs

"We know that when we make decisions through the lens of user safety, it will benefit the broader ecosystem. Preserving trust for advertisers and publishers helps their businesses succeed in the long term," states Google blog.

This story has been published from a wire agency feed without modifications to the text.

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Google says it removed over 3 billion bad advertisements globally in 2020 - Mint

Some 22,000 businesses, publishers, and nonprofits in Connecticut used Google products to increase their online presencelast year, generating $6.6 billion in economic activity, according to the tech giant.

Over 210,000 local businesses have connected with customers through Google services, the company said, noting that since 2009 it has awarded over $7 million in grants to nonprofits and other organizations in the state.

In 2020, Google provided $6.8 million in in-kind search advertising credit to Connecticut nonprofits through the Google Ad Grants program. Over 1,100 Connecticut residents have also enrolled in Googles IT Support Certificate programsince its launch in 2018.

A Connected Commerce Council poll, conducted Feb. 12-26, 2021, reported that 97% of U.S.-based small business owners say that digital tools have been helpful in running their business, with 81 percent incorporating new digital tools and strategies due to Covid.

Looking forward, small business owners remain optimistic about the future of their businesses, with 92% believing they will maintain or increase their use of digital tools post pandemic.

As previously reported, Google has also announced plans to invest more than $7 billion and create at least 10,000 new full time Google jobs across the United States this year.

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Google says CT use of its products generated $6.6 billion in economic activity last year - Westfair Online

The dust is slowly starting to settle after Googles announcement in early March that it wont build new ways to track users or support email-based IDs once third-party cookies are phased out in Chrome.

But the industry still has heaps of questions.

Will publisher-provided identifiers (PPIDs) be used on YouTube? Will buyers and sellers be able to use an encrypted pathway to pass hashed emails and/or the other new cookieless IDs being concocted by the industry? Do FLoCs actually solve the privacy problems associated with third-party cookies, or do they just create new ones?

And will Google, despite its claims to the contrary, eventually find a way to continue tracking users across the web as some in the industry believe it will do?

Senior AdExchanger editor Sarah Sluis put these questions and more to Chetna Bindra, Googles group product manager for user, trust, privacy and transparency, during a fireside chat at AdExchangers Innovation Labs: Identity Day event on Tuesday.

Are PPIDs essentially a workaround?

Last week, Google announced plans to expand the use of PPIDs, which are unique identifiers created by publishers based on a first-party cookie or login ID that can then be hashed and passed to buyers through Google Ad Manager.

PPIDs arent new theyve been around since roughly 2013 but theyre potentially newly useful as a way to make first-party cookies shareable with a demand-side platform.

But how does that development make sense in light of Googles assertion that email-based IDs are no bueno?

The difference is the focus on facilitating first-party relationships, Bindra said, and making sure that publishers can continue to use their first-party data to monetize their sites and only their sites through Googles sell-side platforms.

It is something we ensure is kept publisher specific, Bindra said. We are not pooling or enabling pooling to happen across publisher sites [and] as Google we will not be able to read or act on any data that represents a user being tracked across the web.

Good enough for me but what about thee?

Which is fine, but begs the question of whether Google plans to sip its own Kool-Aid and use PPIDs on YouTube.

Technically, the answer is no. Conceptually, though, the answer is yes.

The technology that YouTube uses to monetize via first-party data is not the same technology that underpins PPIDs, but the principle is the same, Bindra said.

It is absolutely consistent with YouTube or any other publisher property that we have where it will primarily be first-party personalized based on that direct relationship with the user, she said.

So, publishers are covered, but can brands connect their first-party data into a PPID?

As long as the data a brand brings to bear is first party, then bring it on.

Googles ad platforms will continue to support advertiser first-party data so that buyers can target users on different sites if those users are also represented within that particular publishers first-party data, Bindra said.

Thats as true for PPIDs as it is for the APIs in the Privacy Sandbox, including FLEDGE, TURTLEDOVE, et al.

Are FLoCs a can of privacy worms?

Speaking of the sandbox, though, big questions remain about one of the most talked about proposals under development Federated Learning of Cohorts and whether its truly a privacy safe replacement for third-party cookie-based behavioral advertising.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation, for example, doesnt think so.

Beyond valid questions as to the efficacy of cohort-based advertising a major topic of debate in the W3Cs Improving Web Advertising Business Group right now one of the biggest concerns about FLoCs is whether the unsupervised machine learning algorithm that will be used to create them could end up grouping users into sensitive categories.

Because its one thing to create a FLoC of auto intenders in a certain geo, and quite another to cluster a group of people based on religion, for example, ethnicity or whether theyre suffering from depression.

According to Bindra, Chrome is very focused on making sure that individuals will not be placed into groups that are deemed sensitive.

There is a lot of testing and technology being developed here before a cohort becomes active, she said.

One option, she said, is for the browser to analyze whether someone is visiting pages related to sensitive topics at a high rate and then, without the browser necessarily knowing what the specific topics are, to prevent the clustering of those people based on those categories.

(What could go wrong?)

Okay, sure, lets trust the machines. But how can people opt out of browser-created FLoCs?

The dialogue about how consent, opt-ins and opt-outs will function in the Privacy Sandbox is still ongoing, Bindra said.

The origin trials that are planned for later this month are focused on ensuring that users are able to opt out of FLoCs, she said. Its still in the early stages to really evaluate what that looks like.

But what about Googles inherent advantages over the rest of the ecosystem, like the fact that its got a proprietary browser that people can log into?

Google has no intention to build or use any type of technology to track individual people as they browse the web, Bindra said, including using the Chrome login which, is not meant to be core to do any of the ad monetization efforts moving forward.

Just to emphasize and underscore it and Jerry Dischler [Googles VP and GM of ads] said it at the IAB [Annual Leadership Meeting] last week, as well: We will not build backdoors, Bindra said. We will not build workarounds for ourselves to continue to track individual people as they browse across the web.

So, once and for all, Google will not support the Unified ID 2.0 initiative?

Bindra had a one-word answer for that one: Correct.

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Innovation Labs: Google's Chetna Bindra Gives The Lowdown On PPIDs, FLoCs And UID - AdExchanger