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ecently, the European Union has ruled against Google
RAnalytics, allowing three countries to ban the service.
REGULATORS The EU has been looking at Google and potential abuses
of its virtual monopoly of search engines, especially
regarding mobile devices and apps, especially under
the General Data Protection Regulations. As Google
BAN GOOGLE cannot ensure the privacy of its users from third-party
applications and the United States government, three
countries have decided to ban the service. This may create
ANALYTICS issues for web designers, especially those dependent on
Google Analytics for its keyword analysis.

CAUSING THEM The Demands of Privacy
Under the GDPR, users are supposed to have some
form of due process for redress. However, users need to
TO LOSE TRACK know how their data is used to sue for potential redress.
However, while sites do inform users that their information,
which includes IP information, personal information, and
credit information, is collected through cookies, how it is
OF MILLIONS OF used is often a mystery to users. As that information is
often distributed to third parties and can be accessed by
the American government, countries are understandably
USERS unsure about the uses of that data and are unsure how
users would be able to seek redress if that data were to
get out.

With that in mind, Italy, France, and Austria have
banned Google Analytics. Italy has given Caffiena Media,
its domestic web services provider, 90 days to transfer
away from the service. Simple Analytics noted on its blog
that Austria already blocked the service back in January
while France's Commission on the Freedom of Liberation
did the same in February. Google's defenses and appeals
have so far been dismissed as it has not been able to
show that the data could be effectively anonymized before
transmitting that data to the United States.

As Google holds the keys to encryption, its encryption
process does not count for the purposes of the rules.

This decision is coming from the Schrems II decision
from a Court of Justice case in 2020. It effectively
invalidated an earlier Privacy Shield framework that
protected data transfers to the United States. While
Google is about to shut down its Universal Analytic
platform, clients are on it until October 2023. While Google
Analytics 4 does not use trackers as much but still obtains
the same data, is currently available but is unlikely to help
its case with the EU. They have struggled to develop more
privacy-minded trackers over the last few years.

This Complicates Life for Designers
Suffice to say that this makes life all sorts of
complicated for web designers. At the very least, this
represents millions of users that are not sending their

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