Got Adsense? Get A Privacy Policy
Here's a new bit from the latest Adsense TOS changes (it's on the page when you log into Adsense that you have to accept by May 25th)…
You must have and abide by an appropriate privacy policy that clearly discloses that third parties may be placing and reading cookies on your users’ browser, or using web beacons to collect information, in the course of ads being served on your website. Your privacy policy should also include information about user options for cookie management.
In other words, if you use Adsense on a site, you MUST have a privacy policy, and that privacy policy MUST tell visitors about Cookies and what they can do about them.
I've been using Privacy Policy pages (on my non-personal sites) for the last few years, as it's already a requirement in the UK. I shall just add something like (note that I am not a legal beagle and so do not know if this would be OK in the eyes of Google-God or not);
Cookies
A "cookie" is a small file containing a string of characters that is sent to your computer when you visit a website. When you visit the website again, the cookie allows that site to recognize your browser. Cookies may store user preferences and other information. You can reset your browser to refuse all cookies or to indicate when a cookie is being sent. However, some website features or services may not function properly without cookies.
Got anything to add to that?
Note that this does not have to be added until you accept the Change to the TOS.
Comment by Oli — March 6, 2008 @ 3:16 pm
Yet another reason for Google to randomly close down accounts then
Comment by Stu — March 9, 2008 @ 1:59 pm
I'm a bit with Oli on this one - I think this might be a way to grab anyone who's flying pretty close to the wind as far as the AdSense TOS.
This will be a giant pain in the ass for someone (like me?) who has god only knows how many sites across different domains. subdomains, and subdirectories.
I now need to find the time to dig up all these sites. I'm a bit worried I might forget a one-pager I threw up a few years ago, and it'll cost me my account.
Been thinking it was time to change a lot of my sites over to affiliate sites anyway.
Comment by burt — March 10, 2008 @ 1:07 pm
I think that you are both correct - a very easy way for GoogleGod to nuke accounts. Hope that you both are looking at alternative Stream of Income ?