YouTube blocking and Europe privacy

We have seen YouTube doubling down on ads. But privacy advocates in the EU seems to think otherwise.

The Verge reports that YouTube’s ad blocking crackdown is facing a new challenge: privacy laws:

One privacy expert, Alexander Hanff, filed a complaint in October with the Irish Data Protection Commission (DPC). Hanff argues that YouTube’s ad blocker detection system is a violation of privacy

Whatever effect this has in Europe might have none on this side of the ocean, but it is still a good indication of where things are headed.

Hanff first reached out to the European Commission about the use of ad blocker detection tools in 2016. In response to his concerns, the commission confirmed that scripts used to detect ad blockers also fall under Article 5.3 of the ePrivacy Directive, a rule that requires websites to ask for user consent before storing or accessing information on a user’s device, such as cookies.

It’s actually just Google trying again, or thinking it’s a different case.

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I doubt this will change anything here since Canadian privacy laws are toothless in that context and the long awaited overhaul of the legislation hasn’t happened and doesn’t seem to be a priority. And Google capability into (wrongly) geoblocking can totally be put to work to try continously and selectively enforce the ad-blocking-blocking.