If you’re concerned about the targeted ads that appear in Chrome, Google has a new, official extension to hopefully help put your mind at ease.
The extension is called Ads Transparency Spotlight (ATS) and for now it’s marked as Alpha, meaning it’s far from complete, but functional. However, the information on offer looks to be invaluable for anyone interested in why they are seeing certain ads, where they come from, and what personal information was used to decide to show them to you.
As ZDNet reports, Google created ATS as part of a broader effort to regain user trust in advertising. It works by using a new API called Ad Disclosure Schema, which offers advertisers a “uniform system” through which they can share how ads came to be presented to individual users. Google is the first to use it, but other advertisers are being encouraged to share ad information, too.
As the ATS page explains, “The extension includes the criteria used to show these ads, the ad tech companies helping to display these ads, and the ad platform companies serving these ads on a web page. It also lists all companies and services with a presence on the page (for example, content delivery networks or analytics providers).” Users will be able to quickly see how many ads are being displayed on a particular page, how many companies are involved, and even the reasons why they were shown.
Once installed, the ATS icon will be visible on the Chrome interface. Clicking it will display the ATS flyout containing all the relevant ad information. There’s currently three tabs of information on the flyout, titled Explore this page, Ads, and Data collection. And as it’s an Alpha, Google would really appreciate your feedback from using it.
