Google’s FLoC a bad idea, and WordPress is blocking it

Google announced its latest Federated Learning of Cohorts or simply FLoC, it’s the company’s new ad tracking feature that will replace third-party cookies. It has already entered into its testing phase and it places people with similar browsing histories in a group for target advertising.

However, most of the famous browsers such as the DuckDuckGo, Brave, Vivaldi, and Mozilla have opted out of FLoC, and are against the complete implementation of the new Algorithm.

According to recent sources, WordPress, an open-source content management system, that powers about 41% of the web has also joined the list of those opposing the new tech from Google. It stated that it will block Google’s new ad tracking technology as the company sees it as a security concern.

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WordPress released four lines of code that can help developers block FLoC for their websites. However, those who are willing to accept the terms of FLoC can do so and there isn’t any restriction, however, WordPress has voiced its opposition to the algorithm by releasing the lines of code.

“While it is indeed unusual to treat a new “feature” this way, there is precedent in that something that was not strictly a security vulnerability in comments was back-ported to previous versions for the good of the community as a whole.”

Security analysts have openly criticized Google’s FLoC, even going as far as calling it a bad idea. Placing people in groups based on their browsing habits is likely to facilitate employment, housing, and other types of discrimination, as well as predatory targeting of unsophisticated consumers.

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