Back in January, Crumbs responded to one of the largest needs and user requested functionalities in our present online reality. This new approach to privacy innovation allows users to take control of their data while respecting the approved Acceptable Ads Standard. But it doesn’t stop there.
While we believe Crumbs is paving the way for ground-shifting changes in the online advertising space, the mission to constantly strive for an equitable internet that respects user experience continues.
Crumbs and Fractal joining forces
Crumbs is delighted to announce a partnership with Fractal, an open source protocol for exchanging ad-relevant data in a fair and open way. Through this collaboration, they intend on getting ahead of the curve by researching and developing a new open source standard to govern data exchange.
Fractal Founder and CEO Julian Leitloff says, “With a shared vision of democratizing data and giving users more control of their privacy, this partnership represents an opportunity to create a level playing field for data availability in the ad industry.”
Improving data privacy and exchange
More than ever, it is clear that cookies are becoming a thing of the past. The web and the web’s economy are in a quest for a new infrastructure that would nurture the generation and distribution of data and services, while also protecting the rights and interests of each of us online citizens. That also means there is a need for innovations that manage the data exchange between advertisers and users. Our first step is to work on a solution that doesn’t just replace cookies, but improves upon the data exchange for all parties. And of course at the heart of this is also preserving user privacy, because users are demanding more changes as they become more privacy aware.
According to Leitloff, “This change in user expectation surprisingly resonates with the aspiration of media buyers to have the same level of transparency and trust over the data they execute their strategy on, benefiting all parties.”
Building an open source protocol
This new partnership between Crumbs and Fractal aims to support the adoption of Fractal’s blockchain-based open source protocol for exchanging information online, while ensuring user privacy and data ownership.
For users, this means complete control over who should be able to access their personal data and on what terms. Access can always be revoked when the user is no longer interested in sharing their information. The protocol is made with the awareness that data exchange is crucial for enabling online content creation, as it is at the base of this content’s monetization. In other words, if having to choose, most online users still prefer to fund the content they consume by having it displayed with ads.
However, what Crumbs and Fractal deem crucial is that this users’ data is shared in a fair, purposeful and privacy-preserving manner, that will ensure that the legitimate expectations of all parties are protected.
For advertisers and publishers, the protocol will offer a sustainable alternative and stable value system to ensure that the content we all benefit from will be incentivized properly. The Fractal protocol, alongside Crumbs, will offer a balance-point that enables the sharing of data needed for different essential marketing use cases, yet, also not more than necessary to fulfill these use cases.
Marketers gain from that in two main ways: amid new privacy restrictions by both platforms and legislators, they will be granted with sufficient anonymized user data to achieve their marketing goals, while also complying with privacy laws such as GDPR and CCPA, or new browsers’ limitations. This way, the web can remain a free, accessible place.
We’re excited to move forward with Fractal and truly believe this partnership will further bridge the gap between privacy and identity. We will keep you in the loop with more progress, but in the meantime, you can learn more about Crumbs here.
