Privacy
Privacy and security – integral to human rights and civil liberties – have long been important in the Web Consortium's agenda. For example, our work has been instrumental in improving Web security through the development of authentication technologies that can replace weak passwords and reduce the threats of phishing and other attacks.
However, users rightly fear the misuse of their personal data and being tracked online, including browser fingerprinting, the spread of disinformation, and other online harms. These are difficult and urgent challenges. We have begun discussions about how to help users find trustworthy content on the Web without increasing censorship.
Privacy incubation
Two W3C Community Groups formed following TPAC 2021, hoping to address tasks that might be complicated by the ongoing deprecation of third party cookies: Federated Identity CG and Anti Fraud CG.
There's a new Private Advertising Technology CG to incubate proposals previously discussed (primarily) in the Web Advertising Business Group.
The Privacy Community Group hosts incubation of new specifications. The group is seeing vibrant participation; its calls routinely draw over 50 participants. Work items include:
- NEW: an API for requesting access to blocked storage.
- Two proposals that may help facilitate login state management in a world where third-party cookies and other tracking mechanisms are being rapidly deprecated: a proposal to Target Privacy Threat Model document.
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