The endless cookie settings that pop up for every website feel a bit like prank compliance by a surveillance internet hell-bent on not changing. It is very annoying. And as it turns out, it doesn’t even matter what you click. Because “Real-Time Bidding,” the primary tracking-based ad system, nevertheless “broadcasts internet users’ behavior and real-world locations to thousands of companies, billions of times a day.” And the main European provider of these pestering pop-ups to Google (NASDAQ:GOOGL) and 80% of all websites in Europe knew it and is now in trouble.
This fake compliance also feels a little bit like revenge on regulators by ad-driven tech, giving the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) a bad name and so it might seem like political bureaucrats have once again clumsily interfered with the otherwise smooth progress of innovation.