July 26, 2021- 8:57 p.m.
For those unfamiliar, FLoC is a tracking program that aims to replace third-party cookies by using machine learning algorithms to put people into groups based on their browsing habits and data from these groups is then shared with advertisers.
While this is an improvement over how third-party cookies have traditionally been used to track users on an individual basis, a growing number of companies have decided to opt out of FLoC or turn off the technology altogether.
So far, Brave, Vivaldi, Microsoft, GitHub, WordPress, DuckDuckGo, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, and others have expressed opposition to FLoC, which could be one of the reasons why Google hasn’t extended the trial.
However, Google isn’t done with FLoC yet, and the company plans to bring its improved tracking technology to browsers by the end of next year.
Last month, security researcher Jane Manchun Wong discovered that Twitter was collecting data for FLoC by examining the source code of its website.
Now, however, it appears that the social network has removed support for FLoC from its website as the new tracking technology is increasingly criticized online.
In a recent tweetWong explained that “as of now Twitter has removed the code related to collecting FLoC from users”. This could change in the future, especially as Google is now rewriting FLoC , as it has decided not to extend its trial of tracking technology further.
