Do-not-track settings are less than meets the eye

Microsoft has enjoyed months of great press for its promise to make Do Not Track the default setting on its forthcoming iteration of Internet Explorer, but it has left out one important detail: Users will still be tracked.

That also goes for users of Chrome, whose parent Google announced last week to fanfare — and praise from Federal Trade Commission Chairman Jon Leibowitz — that it will provide a prominent DNT privacy setting option as well. Users of Mozilla’s Firefox, too, aren’t getting what they think when they click on the existing option not to be tracked. The reason: There’s nothing to force ad networks to honor it, as the browser companies well know. “It’s an option that doesn’t do anything,” said former FTC Chief Privacy Officer Marc Groman, now executive director of the Network Advertising Initiative, a trade group. “That totally provides users with a false sense of security.”