Would you prefer to get Ad-Based Internet As Opposed to Subscription-Based? - Cookieless Advertising Solution

By Dror Ben-Yishai, Intent IQ’s CTO

In today’s privacy-oriented world, the AdTech ecosystem is in a flux. On the one hand, we can see an increasing amount of laws and regulations being implemented as a way to protect users’ privacy, however on the other hand, the resulted changes seems not to be what the users had in mind.

The expected result of these rules and regulations, is that more publishers will turn to a subscription model to make up for their advertising losses. However, according to a recent IAB report, 75% of Europeans, that are known for caring a lot about internet privacy, even more so than Americans are, prefer ad-supported internet and don’t want to pay for access to sites and apps.

More so, many Americans choose to believe that their online behavior being tracked happens in their best interests or is a price to pay for getting free or discounted products.

Big Tech Taking on User Privacy

Today, big tech companies have come under scrutiny when it comes to users’ privacy in the online space. Third-party cookies in particular have been singled out for the way they collect user information. Google and Apple, amid the backlash of this criticism, are both proposing methods to do away with the classic internet advertising ecosystem.

Google’s Privacy Sandbox proposes to group internet users with similar browsing patterns together, as opposed to individually. With Privacy Sandbox Businesses will still be able to target ads to relevant audiences, but these will be groups of people instead of individuals.

Apple, on the other hand, has come up with its App Tracking Transparency, a system that will require app publishers to give users the choice to opt into the Identifier for Advertisers (IDFA) or not. In other words, users will have a choice regarding whether they want to share their personal information in an opt-in manner.

With all of these new methods for upholding users’ privacy, you would think that u would be willing to adopt a subscription model to their favorite sites (aka the publishers). And yet, this is not the case.

This shows that Google and Apple’s decisions to make ad-supported models more difficult goes against the public’s wishes.

Do User Privacy and Targeted Ads Really Contradicts?

While Google and Apple are planning a disruption to the entire ad and internet ecosystem where their motives are more than meets the eye, we believe that strict consumer privacy and control do not have to be at odds with free/ad-supported access.

Intent IQ’s Data Sharing Choices (‘DSC’) mitigates these needs, being an elegant, practical solution to this problem. Data Sharing Choices (‘is a simple, standardized invitation for a user to opt-in and agree to anonymous data sharing, giving users the choice to approve or deny a site permission to share their anonymous ID. Advertisers can then target ads based on consumer behavior without ever having their actual personal information. This solution maintains user privacy while preserving the current ad ecosystem.

Data Sharing Choices is powered by Intent IQ’s Browser Identity Hub (‘BIH’) service, which addresses third-party cookieless environments, such as the one created by Apple’s iOS Safari or the future Google’s Chrome, by stepping in and providing a privacy-friendly universal ID across 80% of sites’ cookieless ad inventory, powering targeting and attribution across sites and devices.

Google and Apple are big names, the biggest, and it’s easy to go along with what they say to be true. But why? If there’s a better solution available, it’s worthwhile checking out. to learn more about BIH.