The Cookie is Crumbling – Project Rearc Update

As Project Rearc continues to make strides towards developing long-term industry solutions for the impending death of the cookie, the need for all industry stakeholders to work together has never been greater.  

The benefits of an open eco-system with standardized approach are clear. Well-articulated, standard and transparent consumer options as well as data rights combined with strong audits and accountability will drive trust in our industry. The answer is a global technical framework for privacy compliance across all jurisdictions including our own, here in Canada. We need to trust one another and resist the urge to establish custody over the citizen, which will only lead to consumer confusion, while fueling industry skepticism of regulators across the globe and making the problem our industry faces even greater 

Rearc is now entering the third phase of the project which is all about solution design. This week, a series of addressable media business use cases will be released to form the base of principles and solutions created by the privacy policy and legal and technology standards working groups. Next steps will also include further work on the global privacy platform – developing a common schema to work easily across regions with roots based in the work already done with the TCF in Europe. Also in the works is a regionalized code of conduct or accountability program as well as the development of auditable data structures that will provide a critical chain of custody that can be used to prove that the rights of the user are being put first.

Another important development this week is an upcoming meeting with Apple to discuss the challenges associated with the IDFA. IAB Tech Lab is preparing for this important meeting taking place next week by carefully reviewing the privacy moves outlined here. IAB Canada is currently working to collect and consolidate a list of clarifying questions from our members that will be used to seed the conversation with Apple. If you have any questions that you would like considered, please send them to policy@iabcanada.com no later than Friday, January 22 at noon. We also invite all members to join our Rearc Slack channel where you will be kept up to date on any project developments.