The culprit: https://trustarc.com
Been noticing this provider getting used more frequently on other websites. Why are so many sites using this when it makes the user experience significantly worse?
And when it finally does process (which took about 40 seconds) you get this:
“Some vendors cannot receive opt-out requests via https protocols so the processing of your opt-out request is incomplete. To complete the opt-out process, please click here to resubmit your preferences.”
So there’s no way to opt-out of all vendors… Am I being dumb or is this solution an utter failure in every regard.
Considering Trustarc themselves have nothing to gain in allowing vendor tracking for services that use this, and the primary goal being to “ensure you remain compliant with global privacy regulations” (their words). Unless their market audience are services who want it to be as intentionally shit as possible? Maybe.
A company who wants to promote customer privacy has a very simple job, they simply don’t harvest data on their customers, they don’t install tracking files on people’s machines. What Trustarc does for it’s customers (the websites, not you) is to help them harvest as much data as possible without running afoul of the various data laws around the world. They are a compliance company, not an individual rights company.
Their primary goal is to ensure the company remains compliant with global privacy regulations.
They’re lying. They don’t care about you at all.
Or they’re fucking lying.
Have you considered the possibility they’re just fucking lying?
They might market themselves as having a high opt in rate, such if they were properly informing people might be high, or providing a broken experience like this, would also be high.