Google Makes it Easier for Third-Party Cookies: Here’s What You Should Know

Starting January 4, Google Chrome limits third-party cookies access for 1% of users. Google plans to gradually increase this percentage, impacting all Chrome users worldwide by Q3 2024.

To ensure a smooth transition, Google allows websites and businesses to request extra time to move away from reliance on third-party cookies for non-advertising purposes.

Temporary Third-party Cookies Access Provided by Deprecation Trials

Google’s deprecation trials, introduced recently, will temporarily enable access to third-party cookies for eligible third-party services until December 27, 2024.

Strict Eligibility Criteria:

• Services related to advertising won’t be approved.
• Origins matching known ad-related domains, including subdomains, will be rejected.
• Direct end-user impact is required for qualification, with issues only affecting later data analysis not considered.
• Submitting steps to reproduce broken functionality is mandatory, logged through bug reports to Google.
• Google will only consider requests with validated apparent breakage, providing an appeals process for clarification.
• Sites using domains for ads and non-ads will be denied due to the ad-related content.

The deprecation trial aims to allow only services with functional breakage to utilize third-party cookies, not to alleviate data collection inconveniences. However, to start the trials, approved services can activate them by including unique access tokens in Chrome.

To accommodate the brief period between registration opening and cookies being blocked for 1% of traffic, Google offers a grace period until April 1, 2024, for approved sites to implement their tokens.

For guidance on adding the trial token to web pages, Google has provided detailed instructions and guidelines on a help page.

Summary

Certain third-party services can seek temporary cookie access via deprecation trials, but qualifying for this extension is highly restricted. However, the purpose is to assist services demonstrating actual functional issues rather than those related to data collection.

For business owners dependent on third-party services or cookies, it’s crucial to assess their site’s usage and formulate contingency plans. As the rollout progresses, there’s a limited time to address potential impacts before a larger portion of visitors is affected.

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