In response to the Competition and Markets Authority’s announcement that it is intending to release Google from its commitments regarding the Privacy Sandbox proposals, James Rosewell, co-founder of Movement for an Open Web, said:
“It is clearly too soon to let Google off the hook around Privacy Sandbox. Their recent announcement that they no longer intend to block cookies made no ongoing or irrevocable commitment that this would remain the case and they have publicly stated that they intend to continue developing Privacy Sandbox on Android. The threat from Privacy Sandbox has decreased but it has not gone away.
“Given that the US Department of Justice intends to force Google to divest Chrome we would suggest that the Commitments remain in place until this has happened. We recognise that there may be a lower level of scrutiny now that the primary anti-competitive threat has been removed but it’s vital that the CMA continues to monitor the situation.
“As the group that filed the original complaint that led to the Commitments we will continue to closely follow Google’s actions in this area and we would hope that the CMA will remain open to input should Google once again try and leverage the technology for anticompetitive ends.”