Providing people with transparency and control over how their data is used—and ensuring their choices are respected—are key pillars of Google’s approach to developing advertising products. In a complex digital advertising ecosystem, we’re committed to supporting efforts to manage user consent and compliance through a standardized framework. That’s why by August 15, 2020, we’ll integrate our ads systems with the IAB Europe’s Transparency and Consent Framework (TCF) v2.0, in line with the switchover date from v1.0 set by the IAB Europe.
As a member of IAB Europe’s TCF Working Group, we contributed to the development of TCF v2.0. This new framework standardizes the process of gathering, managing and communicating user permissions for how their information may be used in the advertising supply chain. Most significantly, it means that people can make choices on a per vendor and per purpose basis, and this choice will be respected in the ads that are served by all participating platforms. With improved interoperability, publishers and marketers using TCF v2.0 have more control and flexibility about how they integrate and collaborate with their technology partners, including Google.
To support our partners with the transition, we will give them a 90-day grace period from August 15 to ensure their implementation is working properly and meeting our policy requirements.
Our integration with the TCF v2.0 applies to ads we serve on publisher inventory and not Google owned and operated inventory, for which consent is obtained through our own consent flows. The integration also doesn’t change any of our policies for publishers or marketers, including our EU User Consent Policy, which helps ensure users have transparency into and control over how their data is being collected and used to serve personalized ads.
It is up to our partners whether they choose to use TCF v2.0. Publishers can still continue to work with Google independently by using the Ad Technology Provider controls we launched in 2018 across Ad Manager, AdSense and AdMob. Marketers can still continue to work with Google independently by using the features launched in 2018 across Google Ads and Display & Video 360. These controls will continue to function outside of the TCF v2.0.
This integration marks the successful collaboration across our industry for a standardized framework that combines both ease of use and interoperability, and will give people greater control over how their data is used.
