I don't care about cookies • Hacker News Board

Re: I don't care about cookies

#121

Post by sdflhasjd » Sat, Mar 20, 2021, 10:42 AM UTC

speleding wrote: post #111

MakersF wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The law forced the companies to be explicit about what they do, and ask for consent. The user experience is made shit by the companies doing shady things. If they didn't do shady shit, they wouldn't have to display any banner. I'd rather be informed, at least I can make a decision that way. Why shoot the messenger? The part that is missing is making rejecting as easy as accepting. So far there are a lot of dark patte…

How is something like having Google Analytics on your site "shady shit"? I would think counting unique visitors is a legitimate business interest for most businesses. And there is no way to do that without a cookie, or without storing IP address (which is considered personally identifiable info). The law could have been much better if it simply asked browser makers to provide a single place to configure your preferen…

I'm sure it's possible to do analytics in a user friendly way - you can do basic analytics without storing IPs or using cookies.

The problem is that Google Analytics isn't _just_ collecting data for you, it's collecting a trove of other data that it's using to track and link users accross other websites.

Re: I don't care about cookies

#122

Post by enumjorge » Sat, Mar 20, 2021, 10:56 AM UTC

admissionsguy wrote: post #100

I have been using this for months and it hugely improved my web browsing experience. I would love it to become a browser feature at some point. (Yes, I really dislike how the "privacy" warriors are dragging everyone into their pointless crusades.)

Pointless in your opinion. Tech companies’ obsession with tracking has really degraded the experience of the web, and at least someone is pushing back. If you don’t like the situation get mad at the companies who abused the lack of regulation.

Re: I don't care about cookies

#123

Post by II2II » Sat, Mar 20, 2021, 10:57 AM UTC

1vuio0pswjnm7 wrote: post #39

rlpb wrote: post #7

The consent popups you see aren't just about cookies though. They want (and sometimes illegally force) you to consent to processing of your personal information for reasons beyond just providing you with a service (or more commonly just reading an article). Cookies might be one technical means to assist with that, but it's not the only means.

Any good examples of these terms. I would like to read through them. I see very few of these pop-ups because I rarely use a graphical browser, and if I do, Javascript is disabled unless necessary. It does seem like the GDPR is being exploited to manipulate how users consent in a way that benefits the website's online ad scheme more than the user's experience. If I were drafting a GDPR, I would standardise the consent…

> Any good examples of these terms. I would like to read through them. I see very few of these pop-ups because I rarely use a graphical browser, and if I do, Javascript is disabled unless necessary.

General terms: https://www.st.com/content/st_com/en/common/privacy-portal/c...

Breakdown of cookie use: https://www.st.com/content/st_com/en/common/privacy-portal/p...

Technical opt-out measures: https://www.st.com/content/st_com/en/common/privacy-portal/p...

> It does seem like the GDPR is being exploited to manipulate how users consent in a way that benefits the website's online ad scheme more than the user's experience.

Agreed.

> If I were drafting a GDPR, I would standardise the consent mechanism and not allow for much creativity. Ideally IMO the consent process, e.g., each pop-up, should be so predictable that consent/denial of consent could be automated. Asking users to read terms, and engage in some sort of interactive consent is not practicable. Users will just click "OK" or whatever they need to in order to make the pop-up go away. Website developers know this and it should be no surpise if they are taking advantage of that to sneek in all manner of one-sided terms.

I would agree, except ... these pop-ups are visible and it is easy to verify that certain information is being presented. The failure review such information falls to the end user, even though there are legitimate reasons why they would click to make the pop-up go away (e.g. the time required to review the information). Unfortunately, it is difficult for most people to verify which cookies are being used by a particular site and it is impossible for them to verify how they are being used.

Re: I don't care about cookies

#124

Post by TeMPOraL » Sat, Mar 20, 2021, 10:58 AM UTC

speleding wrote: post #111

MakersF wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The law forced the companies to be explicit about what they do, and ask for consent. The user experience is made shit by the companies doing shady things. If they didn't do shady shit, they wouldn't have to display any banner. I'd rather be informed, at least I can make a decision that way. Why shoot the messenger? The part that is missing is making rejecting as easy as accepting. So far there are a lot of dark patte…

How is something like having Google Analytics on your site "shady shit"? I would think counting unique visitors is a legitimate business interest for most businesses. And there is no way to do that without a cookie, or without storing IP address (which is considered personally identifiable info). The law could have been much better if it simply asked browser makers to provide a single place to configure your preferen…

> How is something like having Google Analytics on your site "shady shit"? I would think counting unique visitors is a legitimate business interest for most businesses.

Just because it's free and somewhat nice looking, doesn't mean it isn't shady shit. Maybe all you care about is counting unique visitors, but by doing that with Google Analytics, you're exposing your visitors to a complex surveillance product that collects data for its own purposes, and it sees much more than what's needed to just count unique visits.

Re: I don't care about cookies

#125

Post by tinus_hn » Sat, Mar 20, 2021, 10:59 AM UTC

matsemann wrote: post #109

fguerraz wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, it is not a good thing. GDPR is a highly complex piece of legislation that is very hard to navigate and therefore only established companies with big bucks to spend on lawyers and extra engineering can profit from the ecosystem while everybody else is put at risk. Complex legislation and regulations is the best way to keep monopolies in place. Same goes for the financial sector, telecoms, etc. It's nearly impossi…

GDPR is sooo easy to follow as a startup. Just gather the data you need and not everything else,and ask for consent. If anything, it was the big players getting work to do. Thousands of people on mailing lists with no control of how they got there. Asked and kept insane amounts of not necessary data. Data floating in hundreds of database tables spread over various services and third party vendors and data centers wit…

It’s hard to follow if you are an old business built on gathering and selling your customers data.

I can see how it’s a though pill to swallow that that was exactly the point.

Re: I don't care about cookies

#126

Post by tinus_hn » Sat, Mar 20, 2021, 11:00 AM UTC

Aeolun wrote: post #79

II2II wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you tried going through these new popups? If they are trustworthy then the current ones allow you to disable some cookies and give you an idea of who is doing the tracking. Even though there are far better ways to manage cookies with browser settings and extensions: the options are sometimes quite limited (e.g. Chrome on Android) and many people would simply be unaware of cookies without these popups. Those peop…

> and many people would simply be unaware of cookies without these popups They are still unaware. Do you honestly think anybody even reads what is on the popup? They just click accept or ok to make it go away immediately.

I read and deny them all.

Re: I don't care about cookies

#127

Post by iamacyborg » Sat, Mar 20, 2021, 11:00 AM UTC

Deukhoofd wrote: post #112

hutghkiuhg wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Speculating here, we could call the checbox "Do Not Track", and make it a browser setting. HN would probably love this. Oh, wait...

The EU is working on legislation to make Do Not Track enforced by law, which should get rid of a lot of the popups. https://ec.europa.eu/digital-single-market/en/proposal-epriv...

I believe something similar is also in the works in California

Re: I don't care about cookies

#128

Post by currysausage » Sat, Mar 20, 2021, 11:01 AM UTC

speleding wrote: post #111

MakersF wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The law forced the companies to be explicit about what they do, and ask for consent. The user experience is made shit by the companies doing shady things. If they didn't do shady shit, they wouldn't have to display any banner. I'd rather be informed, at least I can make a decision that way. Why shoot the messenger? The part that is missing is making rejecting as easy as accepting. So far there are a lot of dark patte…

How is something like having Google Analytics on your site "shady shit"? I would think counting unique visitors is a legitimate business interest for most businesses. And there is no way to do that without a cookie, or without storing IP address (which is considered personally identifiable info). The law could have been much better if it simply asked browser makers to provide a single place to configure your preferen…

Use first-party, privacy-friendly tracking solutions. Usually, first-party cookies don’t require consent.

I would love to have a technical solution for browser-wide consent management, but it wouldn’t solve the issue of granular, informed consent for all the shady things that are possible in adtech.

Also, the law certainly doesn’t prohibit a technical solution, but that really is something that the industry should work out.

Re: I don't care about cookies

#129

Post by ckastner » Sat, Mar 20, 2021, 11:10 AM UTC

sfvisser wrote: post #99

matsemann wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, I can't fathom why the hate is on the law, and not the companies now being exposed by the law.. Seriously, if you don't do shady shit your site doesn't need a popup asking for consent. But even Github has misunderstood it's not about the cookies. They had an article earlier about removing the popup since they managed to do stuff without cookies. The law doesn't care about cookies, it cares about tracking and ill…

> Yes, I can't fathom why the hate is on the law, and not the companies now being exposed by the law.. Because the law obviously didn't help stopping companies from doing shady shit and made the user experience of the web worse?

> Because the law obviously didn't help stopping companies from doing shady shit

It helped immensely. I work in the financial sector in an EU country, and most institutions in my country are terrified about the GDPR.

The fact that some people will happily operate on the border or even closely beyond the border of law, applies to any other regulation as well.

Re: I don't care about cookies

#130

Post by benjiweber » Sat, Mar 20, 2021, 11:17 AM UTC

matsemann wrote: post #87

rlpb wrote: post #7

The consent popups you see aren't just about cookies though. They want (and sometimes illegally force) you to consent to processing of your personal information for reasons beyond just providing you with a service (or more commonly just reading an article). Cookies might be one technical means to assist with that, but it's not the only means.

Yes, I can't fathom why the hate is on the law, and not the companies now being exposed by the law.. Seriously, if you don't do shady shit your site doesn't need a popup asking for consent. But even Github has misunderstood it's not about the cookies. They had an article earlier about removing the popup since they managed to do stuff without cookies. The law doesn't care about cookies, it cares about tracking and ill…

As I understand it PECR does require affirmative consent to use cookies specifically. Often same mechanism is used for data processing bases for GDPR as for PECR consent.

https://ico.org.uk/for-organisations/guide-to-pecr/cookies-a...