New ideas prompted by user consent fatigue
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Image: Lisa from Pexels
The European Union is to propose new legislation in the areas of privacy, AI, and security. Among other things, these measures would lead to more relaxed rules for cookie banners.
This emerges from leaked documents that civil rights organisations and lobbying groups are now raising objections to. Europe’s aim is to introduce uniformity in regulation, but this also leads to fundamental changes that conflict with core European principles.
The proverbial winners of the proposals, which will be presented on 19 November, are the tech companies.
AI providers such as ChatGPT will be given more time to comply with local regulations and will face new transparency requirements for both AI developers and users.
In terms of cookie legislation, Europe is responding to ‘consent fatigue’ – the irritation caused by cookie banners – with the new rules.
In future, users will be required to indicate their cookie preferences through their browser settings. The online sector will then be permitted to develop their own standardisation bodies, which will ensure that computers and smartphones can register and process these choices.
There will be an exception for online news publishers and other media outlets. Under the EU Media Freedom Act, they will not be obliged to respect automated signals. In other words: if someone indicates in their browser that they do not accept tracking cookies, the publisher may disregard this preference.
For media, the public interest of independent journalism outweighs the privacy benefits of automated cookie refusal. It will therefore have slightly more leeway to generate revenue from their digital work. Nevertheless, publishers will still be required to seek consent via banners. The exception applies only to the automated ignoring of browser signals.
Business AM