With the recent misconduct we stated today where the Google and several prominent online advertising networks have been caught circumventing Safari and Mobile safari security restrictions, Microsoft as earlier has taken the sense to be a part of the conversation, pointing towards the search giant and using it as a platform over on its own Internet Explorer 9.
Starting pointing towards the search giant stating Google’s tracking practices are “not new”, Microsoft’s blog post entitled ‘Browse Without Being Browsed’, says, “Google has been able to track users of Apple’s Safari browser while they surf the web on their Apple iPhones, iPads and Macs. This type of tracking by Google is not new. The novelty here is that Google apparently circumvented the privacy protections built into Apple’s Safari browser in a deliberate, and ultimately, successful fashion.”
Microsoft then proceeds to list how its Internet Explorer 9 browser is recognized as some of the “strongest privacy protection in the industry,” highlighting its Tracking Protection feature and how it puts users in control of their actions online. “Not Google. Not advertisers. Just you,” Microsoft declares.
Apple spokesperson stated, “We are working to put a stop” to the practices in question. When asking Google about the technique, the company reportedly ceased the practice, saying, “The Journal mischaracterizes what happened and why. We used known Safari functionality to provide features that signed-in Google users had enabled. It’s important to stress that these advertising cookies do not collect personal information.”
Google’s workaround was spotted by Jonathan Mayer, Stanford researcher and later corroborated by the WSJ. It was also discovered by the WSJ that the technique was used by at least three other prominent advertising networks as well as Facebook – as both search giant and social networking giant in order to provide user-facing benefits with the practice. The search giant keeps a check against this restrictions pointing in its own theory when it couldn’t use cookies to determine whether the users were logged into any of Google services in conjunction with its +1 recommendation system.
