After months of criticism that the new tools cut off valuable customer-targeting information, the software maker has no plans to change the automatic setting in its newest Internet Explorer browser that tells websites not to track user behavior, General Counsel Brad Smith said.
“We crossed the Rubicon and are completely comfortable being on other side of the river,” he said. “We have no intention of going back and have no intention of engaging in discussion on that possibility.” Smith will provide an update on the company’s position today in a blog posting.
The so-called Do Not Track feature has been at the centre of privacy debates over browsing data and how websites and marketers use it to make money. For Microsoft and the advertisers, at stake is a US$31.7 billion US Internet ad market that grew 22 per cent in 2011, according to the Interactive Advertising Bureau, much of it generated by ads tailored to user behaviour.
Now Microsoft, whose banner advertising business was already losing market share to Facebook and Google, is being criticised by trade groups and facing opposition from advertisers and even partners like Yahoo!, who say they will ignore privacy signals transmitted by Internet Explorer 10.
“Advertisers have invested a lot in their ad platforms and the Achilles heel is the consumers aren’t aware that their data is being bought and sold,” said Anthony Mullen, an analyst at Forrester Research. “That being exposed, which is what this Microsoft initiative does, is healthy, but I can see why the ad industry is nervous.”
Microsoft wants to engage in talks with advertisers and standards bodies to assuage some concerns, Smith said.