The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) wants the browser developers to install a system similar to the ‘Do Not Call’ system, which prevents telemarketers from calling users on their phones.

As a result of the pressure from the FTC, developers have started incorporating measures to prevent advertisers from tracking users against the wishes of the user.

Google has built a Chrome Extension that enables users to permanently opt out of ad tracking. The tool is known as ‘Keep My Opt-Outs’. This feature preserves the user’s privacy settings even if cookies are wiped out. Users will, however, have to opt out of ad tracking themselves.

Google Chrome extension ‘Keep My Opt-outs’

Mozilla, on the other hand, provides an HTTP header that lets users declare a preference along with the basic information they provide to any site that they visit. However, there is one major catch in this system – for it to be successful, advertisers will have to agree to honour the user’s preferences as declared in the HTTP header. According to The Wall Street Journal, no advertisers have agreed to be a part of this deal, so far.

Microsoft has also announced that their new browser, IE 9 will include a feature that will provide “Tracking Protection” to their users.

While it is a good sign that browser developers have started moving in this direction, many advocates of user privacy believe that these opt-out features are just not enough.

A number of privacy advocates insist that instead of opt-out features, which leave the task of opting out to the user, thereby going un-noticed by the non-techie majority, the browsers should enable opt-in features, which safeguard user privacy by default. This way, user tracking by default will be forced to end, and advertisers would only be able to track users who have clearly indicated that they are happy to let advertisers study their browsing habits and target ads at them accordingly.

Chrome, which was launched just over a year ago, certainly does not compete in terms of popularity with Microsoft’s Internet Explorer and Mozilla’s Firefox, both of which have been around a lot longer.

It looks as though Google has decided to take up the challenge to change the situation, and has started actively promoting the browser through some rather unexpected channels in the UK.

Just yesterday, the Metro newspaper, which is distributed for free on the London Underground was “wrapped” in a cover that advertised Chrome.

On the front page of the wrapper, Chrome was described as “A fast new browser. Made for everyone”. On the inside of the cover details about the browser’s unique features, such as its stability and the incognito tab handling methods, were mentioned. On the rear page of the wrapper were ‘notes’ made by a supposed user of Chrome, followed by the line “6 tabs. 0 crashes. 1 browser”.

The Metro is distributed free on all weekdays and readers generally read it during their morning commute. It has a circulation of 1.3 million of which 738,000 users are based in London.

Twitter users have also reported spotting billboards advertising Chrome in London and Manchester. In fact, one such hoarding was placed right across the front gate of the head quarters of Google’s recent critic, Rupert Murdoch’s company, News International.

Magazines, television and blogs are also propagating another Google campaign, promoting Chrome as a free Christmas gift accompanied by a slick flash micro-site that “wraps” the Chrome logo and sends it as a gift with a personalised message to anyone a user wishes to forward it to.

These advertising strategies point to the fact that Google is either trying to advertise Chrome to people who are not yet hooked on the Internet, or they’re running out of ideas to boost Chrome’s popularity.

A number of marketing specialists have criticised the campaign, saying that Google should know better than to target advertising for a product in a medium where prospective adopters cannot convert into users easily. In other words, people reading a newspaper or seeing a billboard will not be likely to go online and download the Chrome browser. However, what the ads will do, is build brand presence in consumers’ minds, which might then help Google when they launch the Chrome operating system.

Sony has already conducted a test run this last May, and the test phase is now almost over.

It may be safe to assume, though, that other browsers will also be available on Sony PCs as they would not want to upset their users.

The deal is a first for Google, and they hope to be able to win similar deals with other computer manufacturers as well, in order to promote Chrome.

Chrome’s market share might get a slight push by this means. Personal computers from Sony account for less than 5% of the US market share. This could be a very good first step in the right direction. However, Google should have probably waited to win some bigger players over to their side before announcing their strategy to their competitors!

With competitors like Microsoft, Google had better watch its back when trying to make in-roads into the PC market. Microsoft pretty much has that market cornered. Internet Explorer comes with the Windows operating system, which is used on over 90% of all PCs shipped.

Internet Explorer and Mozilla’s Firefox browser are way ahead of Chrome in terms of market share. They have, of course, been around for a much longer time.

According to Net Applications, Internet Explorer currently has about two thirds of the market share among Internet users, with 67.7%, Firefox has 22.5%, Apple’s Safari has 4.1%, while Google’s Chrome has a mere 2.59%.

Now, towards the end of 2008, Mozilla has launched the second alpha release of Fennec. They first launched the version that is compatible with the Nokia N810 handset in October 2008 and later with Windows desktop computers. They are also targeting Linux and Mac computers.

Fennec will not be compatible with popular handsets such as the BlackBerry Bold, T-Mobile G1 and iPhone 3G. Christian Sejersen, Mozilla’s director of mobile engineering wrote on his blog that Fennec will not operate on the Android or RIM platforms due to technical or licensing difficulties.

The new version of Fennec has improved abilities of panning and zooming while a page is still downloading, and also after the page is downloaded. It will also be very easy to use facilities such as bookmarks, thumbnails or add tags. A mockup of the browser is shown alongside.

ArsTechnica reports that application developers have already started developing new features to add to Fennec. For instance, there is a Twitter bar extension. If users make use of this they will be able to post information directly on Twitter from the Fennec address bar. Developers are also reportedly working on a Fennec port of the Weave Framework similar to the one for Firefox. It will be a while, therefore, before the finalised product is available.