Important information regarding the user consent policy

This is the message that was sent by Google to all publishers:

Dear Publisher,

We want to let you know about a new policy about obtaining EU end-users’ consent that reflects regulatory and best practice guidance. It clarifies your duty to obtain end-user consent when you use products like Google AdSense, DoubleClick for Publishers, and DoubleClick Ad Exchange.

Please review our new EU user consent policy as soon as possible. This requires that you obtain EU end users’ consent to the storing and accessing of cookies and other information, and to the data collection, sharing, and usage that takes place when you use Google products. It does not affect any provisions on data ownership in your contract.

Please ensure that you comply with this policy as soon as possible, and not later than 30th September 2015.

If your site or app does not have a compliant consent mechanism, you should implement one now. To make this process easier for you, we have compiled some helpful resources at cookiechoices.org.

This policy change is being made in response to best practice and regulatory requirements issued by the European data protection authorities. These requirements are reflected in changes recently made on Google’s own websites.

Thank you in advance for your understanding and cooperation.

How do you guys plan to implement this? If the user has to give his/hers consent, will you show a pop-up window, when the app starts? Will you geographically limit this message in your apps so only the users from EU see it?

They provided a sample message, which is this:

We use device identifiers to personalise content and ads, to provide social media features and to analyse our traffic. We also share such identifiers and other information from your device with our social media, advertising and analytics partners. See details (from cookiechoices.org)

Research shows that people don’t like to be tracked and they are not particularity fond of ads. If we throw them this message right in the face when the app starts, I’m pretty sure that the amount of bad ratings will rise, and many people won’t even understand what this means, or will not proceed to open/use the app.

I received it too, boring…

I’m from Europe and it’s so ridiculous to see these pop up on websites (because most of the time you don’t have the choice to accept or not cookies so what’s the point?), now we have to implement this on apps, that sucks.

I guess we’re gonna have to show this like they do now on websites: a small banner on top of screen on app start up. And obviously we’ll have to limit this to EU users to limit bad ratings and reviews. Anyway, as we have until end of september, I’m gonna see how do they implement this on successful apps.

Google sucks and EU sucks.

I think pretty soon all the apps will have to have some kind of EULA to wrap up and present such boilerplate message on privacy. The good thing is that we’ll need to show and get consent just once (at least that’s my understanding of it), exactly like how all the apps from big development houses and websites that use cookies to track users are doing.

There is already another topic about this… so far looks like only people with Adsense registration got this email.
So maybe it will not apply to Admob and other Ads Network (at least I can still hope^^)

If you have an Admob account, you are automatically registered for Adsense.

I have a developer account with no apps published, but still got that email.

I sent a message to my account manager over at Google and I’m waiting for the response. However., I think that we’re all screwed and we’ll need to annoy our EU users with the consent message. But this should fade out after the initial shock and after everyone else starts to use these messages.

She got back to me, and while I can’t copy/paste her whole message, I can confirm, that apps do need a user consent message pop-up (if you use AdMob or Google Analytics or any other similar product). We need to make clear that the identifiers are shared with 3rd parties and explain why.

Google Ireland is located in the EU, so they have to obey EU laws…

That’s why all that sucks.

I did not get this message, and have been using admob/analytics for a while. Is this for developers that are registered in EU only? I am from USA.

I didn’t got this message…I live in India and I have 3 accounts none of them got any messages about policy…

I think that hey will release the message in waves. Basically, every app that is available in EU countries needs to have this consent message. All other ad networks will need to comply as well.

My main concern is how to limit this message to the EU region only? Any ideas?

I’m currently in the EU. When I open “www.google.de”, “www.google.fr” and other European versions of the site, they show the Cookie warning.
But when I open “www.google.com”, I don’t see the warning (although I’m in the EU).

Since user location is “private information”, we probably have to implement the same message everywhere.

Maybe this message could be limited to the “phone locale”? If set to an EU language, the message would be shown, for example.

Here’s a guide on how to implement it for Android and iOS without adding additional permissions

Android - EU Cookie Law - Stack Overflow

Interesting find @Nana, thanks! Could this actually work?

The code should first check the “networkCountry”.
For example, if someone with a non-EU SIM comes to EU, they should still see that message.

I have not received the message from Google.
I don’t understand if I have to implement the message only if I use Google analytics/ads services, or also with similar services like those I use in my app (Flurry analytics, Startapp and MMedia).

Since it is a EU policy and not a specific Google Policy, is right to assume that Google enforces this policy only if app uses their analytics/ads services?

You are right, it’s an EU policy, so it’s a bit strange that no other ad network has issued this request. To be on the safe side, I would implement the Cookie consent message, no matter what.