What you need to know:

• Cookies not being culled until second half of 2024, per Google.
• Industry needs more time to test, earlier cut-ff risks rise of fingerprinting, other bad trackers, reckons digital behemoth.

Google has confirmed what many suspected. The cull of third party cookies has been kicked further into touch, to the back end of 2024 at the earliest.

Google had told regulators that it would not remove the digital ad industry’s tracking currency until viable alternatives were in place.

Alternatives being worked-up via its Privacy Sandbox have been met with questions over their feasibility. In a blogpost, Google said it and industry need more testing time.

While expected, the stay of execution – following a similar move from Google last year – will be met with a mixture of relief from the digital ad supply chain and resignation from those that have invested significant resource in cookie alternatives.

“This deliberate approach to transitioning from third-party cookies ensures that the web can continue to thrive, without relying on cross-site tracking identifiers or covert techniques like fingerprinting,” stated Google’s Privacy Sandbox chief Anthony Chavez.

“By Q3 2023, we expect the Privacy Sandbox APIs to be launched and generally available in Chrome. As developers adopt these APIs, we now intend to begin phasing out third-party cookies in Chrome in the second half of 2024.”

The industry now has two more years – at least – to prepare.