How Admitad’s tracking technologies protect publishers earnings from Google Chrome SameSite update
How changes in Google Chrome’s policies will affect tracking of targeted actions by publishers and advertisers who work via Admitad?
What happened
On February 4, Google Chrome developers will release an update designed to ensure the security and privacy of the user’s data.
Two following important changes have been introduced in the new version of the browser:
1) If the SameSite parameter is not specified when creating custom cookies, the default value will be changed from ‘None’ to ‘Lax’
2) If a cookie with the SameSite=None value does not have a Secure parameter, the cookie will be rejected by the browser
These changes will affect access of third-party tracking systems to reading the user’s cookies and will block the ability to monitor the user’s jumps from one website to another. As a result, advertising tracking systems may fail to link the user’s movement from the publisher’s website to that of the advertiser, as well as the target action performed by the user.
Google also requests that affiliate networks and other tracking services explicitly indicate the None value for the SameSite parameter:
“If you provide a service that other sites consume such as widgets, embedded content, affiliate programs, advertising, or sign-in across multiple sites, then you should use None to ensure your intent is clear”.
How Admitad services work in view of the Google Chrome update
The Admitad team respects and adheres to standards for ensuring the security and privacy of personal data of Internet users. But we are also answerable to our business partners in the affiliate marketing ecosystem for the accuracy and efficiency of the activities performed using our platform.
On January 13, 2020, the Admitad development team released an update for the TagTag tracking code in light of the changes in the Google Chrome policy with respect to the SameSite parameter. In the new version of the tracking code, when creating a cookie with the click id value (the unique identifier of the jump), the values registered in TagTag will be SameSite=None and Secure.
At that, safe and private tracking of user’s targeted actions in Google Chrome using TagTag will be preserved and will not affect the activities of publishers and advertisers via Admitad.
What about other integration methods
| Integration Method | How it Will Affect Tracking |
| Outdated versions of the tracking code (other than TagTag) | Will not affect, as in older versions the cookie was set by the advertiser. Unlike Admitad, advertisers are not obligated to set None values for their scripts. The request to the Admitad servers will go though correctly, since the script for sending the request is installed on the advertiser’s website (a cookie is used in the first-party context). |
| S2S integration
|
Will not affect, as the advertiser retrieves the cookie value independently in order to have the request sent from the server. |
| Google Analytics | Will not affect, as this integration method does not use cookies |
