As the internet giant faces scrutiny over targeted advertisements being pushed via its platforms, Google will soon ban ad targeting based on the age, gender, or interests of persons under the age of 18. “We’ve already made progress on delivering a safer online experience to kids and teens by expanding safeguards to prevent age-sensitive ad categories from being shown to teens, and we’ll block ad targeting based on the age, gender, or interests of people under 18,” the company said in a statement late Monday.
“We’ve already made progress in providing a safer online experience for kids and teens by expanding safeguards to prevent age-sensitive ad categories from being shown to teens, and we’ll block ad targeting based on the age, gender, or interests of people under 18,” the company said late Monday in a statement. With Privacy Sandbox, Google’s Chrome browser is leading a collaborative effort to make the web private by default, which aims to help reshape digital marketing in a way that respects your privacy standards, according to Google.
“We’ll keep working on interesting new ways to put you in control of your experiences with our products,” the statement continued. Google has begun rolling out new tools, such as our “About this ad” menu, to assist you understand why an ad was shown and which advertiser sponsored it, according to the company. “You can report an ad if you believe it violates one of our standards, see the ads a certain verified advertiser has run in the last 30 days, or mute advertising or advertisers you don’t want to see,” the internet giant explained. On YouTube, viewers can currently turn out sensitive adverts relating to alcohol or gambling.
“We’ll continue to extend our sensitive ad categories shortly,” the business added, “so you can choose the ad experience that’s best for you.”
The search engine behemoth is also implementing a slew of other changes to its kid-friendly services. SafeSearch will now be enabled by default for users under the age of 18, rather than being enabled by default for users under the age of 13. The function, which prevents explicit search results from surfacing, will also be available on Google’s web browser for smart displays. Location History will no longer be available to users under the age of 18 in their Google Account settings (Google says the setting is already off by default for all accounts). In the coming months, assistant-enabled smart devices will be able to limit news, podcasts, and web access.
Autoplay will be turned off by default for children under the age of 18 on YouTube, and break reminders will be enabled. YouTube Kids will gain a new autoplay feature, but it will be disabled by default. New materials “for young people and their parents to help them better understand [Google’s] data practices” will also be available.
On various time scales, new features are being introduced. In the coming weeks, users will be able to request that photos be deleted from Google’s image search, as well as adjustments to the default YouTube video privacy settings. In the coming months, new ad targeting limits, SafeSearch modifications, and methods to ban material on Google Assistant-enabled smart devices will be available.