2025: The Final Cookies - Third-party cookie deactivation postponed again

  • #Google is once again postponing the end of support for third-party cookies in #Chrome.
  • The delay is due to the need for further coordination with the industry, regulators, and developers.
  • The new expected deadline is early next year, hoping to reach an agreement with regulators.

Google has announced a new postponement of the end of support for third-party cookies (#cookieless) in its Chrome browser. This is the third time the company has pushed back the previously set deadline, first announced in January 2020. Initially, Google planned to phase out third-party cookies "within two years" to enhance user security. However, since then, the company has twice postponed the deadlines, each time giving the advertising industry more time to prepare for such significant changes.

At the moment, third-party cookies have been disabled for 1% of Google Chrome users since January 2024, while in Mozilla Firefox and Apple Safari, third-party cookies have already been fully disabled in 2019 and 2020, respectively.

Regulators

The current delay is explained by the need to consider the various opinions of all involved parties. The company emphasizes its commitment to continue interacting with all ecosystem participants and notes the critical importance of providing enough time for the British Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) to analyze all the presented data, including the results of industry tests.

New Date

Given the significance of the aforementioned considerations, Google does not plan to complete the process of phasing out third-party cookies in the second half of the fourth quarter of this year. The company hopes to complete the process of reaching an agreement with CMA and ICO (the independent British authority created to protect information rights) within this year and intends to continue the phase-out of third-party cookies early next year, provided that an agreement is reached.

Industry's Stance

The uncertainty surrounding this issue leads many in the advertising industry to view the new deadlines with skepticism. A recent survey by #Digiday+ Research showed that about 39% of respondents expect the phase-out of third-party cookies to not occur until the second quarter of 2025, while 26% still believe it can be completed by the end of this year.

Implications for Publishers

The discontinuation of third-party cookies is still ongoing, so despite the delay, publishers will need to continue their adaptation to these changes.

Forecast

It is likely that user identification technologies and the transfer of information about them will continue to attract the attention of regulators and industry experts, influencing the further development of privacy and advertising technologies. It is expected that these technologies will continue to develop rapidly and soon.

Additional Resources