This week, on May 25, data protection rules across Europe will undergo the biggest change in the last two decades. It’s a change two years in the making. In April 2016, after years of negotiations and legal tussling, officials agreed upon the European General Data Protection Regulation, commonly abbreviated to GDPR, an acronym you’re probably all sick to death of by this point. However, whilst everyone with an internet connection has heard the term bandied around with gleeful abandon for the last few months, precious few actually understand GDPR and even fewer have any real notion of how it will affect them personally.
GDPR will fundamentally change the way businesses and public sector organizations can handle the information of their customers. In the most basic terms, however, all GDPR is really doing, is bringing outdated personal data rules up to speed with an increasingly and overwhelmingly digital era. The amount of data we now produce wasn’t foreseeable when the current data protection laws were drawn up in the late 90s, which is why GDPR is, in my eyes, a necessary change. Whether or not it’s a necessary ‘evil’, however, is open to debate.To that end, I’ve reached once again into my rolodex to gauge the opinions ad land, with a more specific bias this time around towards digital marketers (for obvious reasons).
Andy Evans, CMO at Sovrn: Data and Privacy has been an issue of concern for users long before the recent Facebook scandal. The changes that will follow GDPR will certainly pose a challenge to the online advertising industry, but will ultimately be good for the user. Sadly, many companies, both big and small, are still not prepared. Some international publishers will potentially cut off their EU inventory in the short term, creating a smaller pool, and, as cookie targeting becomes more difficult, buyers will be thinking about contextual targeting instead. This swing from user targeting to contextual targeting means that creatives will need to focus on the content ads are seen against, rather than the audience which is viewing the ad.
Read the whole story here: Creative Opinions: GDPR
Source: CreativePool
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