794

Reddit said Wednesday that the platform is revamping its privacy settings with an aim to make ad personalization and account visibility toggles consistent. Most notably though, it is removing the ability to opt out of ad personalization based on Reddit activity.

The company said that it will still have opt-out controls in “select countries” without specifying which ones. It mentioned in a blog post that users won’t see more ads but they will see better-targeted ads following this change.

“Reddit requires very little personal information, and we like it that way. Our advertisers instead rely on on-platform activity—what communities you join, leave, upvotes, downvotes, and other signals—to get an idea of what you might be interested in,” Reddit said.

The company is essentially removing the option to not track you based on whatever you do on Reddit.

Additionally, Reddit is consolidating two toggles on showing ads based on activity and information from partners into one toggle. So there is no way to separate those two settings now.

Reddit is seemingly removing toggles for getting post recommendations based on “general location” and activity on partner sites and apps. It’s not clear if this means those parameters will be used for post suggestions by default and there is no way to turn them off.

The social network said it will also roll out controls to limit certain advertising categories such as alcohol, weight loss, dating, gambling pregnancy, and parenting.

The company noted that ad-limiting controls will possibly show you fewer ads from mentioned categories if the toggles are turned off, but won’t possibly filter out all ads. Reddit justified this by saying it uses manual tagging and machine learning to label ads, so there is a chance that it is not 100% accurate.

Reddit is also simplifying its location customization setting under a single menu, which will be easily accessible through settings on apps and on the web.

The social platform has made several changes to increase monetization. It infamously made changes to its data API terms that led to many third-party clients shutting down and subreddits protesting in retaliation. Last week, it rolled out a new creator rewards program to incentivize people to post more and better content on the platform. But it also introduced a change that made it easier for users to purchase Gold rewards.

In an interview with The Verge in June, Reddit CEO Steve Huffman responded to IPO rumors and said “Getting to breakeven is a priority for us in any climate.”

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[-] cosmicrookie@lemmy.world 32 points 1 year ago

I believe it is and they have until the end of the year to comply. I am not entirely sure though

[-] misk@sopuli.xyz 14 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

You're thinking of Digital Markets Act which covers extra responsibilities of tech giants on things like interoperability and self-preferencing.

Being able to opt out of personalized ads is requirement of GDPR which has been in effect for a couple of years now and applies to every company providing services in EU.

[-] ares35@kbin.social 10 points 1 year ago

so they can still fk with shit this year for the ipo; then worry about that next year after those who want 'out', cash out before then.

[-] cosmicrookie@lemmy.world 4 points 1 year ago

Is this the part where they have to allow users to opt out of recommended content too? Somehow it feels like the same thing really.

this post was submitted on 28 Sep 2023
794 points (97.5% liked)

Technology

59340 readers
1508 users here now

This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.


Our Rules


  1. Follow the lemmy.world rules.
  2. Only tech related content.
  3. Be excellent to each another!
  4. Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
  5. Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
  6. Politics threads may be removed.
  7. No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
  8. Only approved bots from the list below, to ask if your bot can be added please contact us.
  9. Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed

Approved Bots


founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS