Despite incessant complaining from advertising and analytics companies, Microsoft (MSFT) is not budging from its pledge to make “Do Not Track” the default setting for its Internet Explorer 10 browser, ZDNet reports. In a company blog post, Microsoft Chief Privacy Officer Brendon Lynch said that “DNT will be enabled in the ‘Express Settings’ portion of the Windows 8 set-up experience” and that “customers will also be given a ‘Customize’ option, allowing them to easily switch DNT ‘off’ if they’d like.”
As ZDNet notes, this action is a direct slap at the W3C Tracking Protection Working Group’s recommendation that DNT not be set as the default browser setting, thus making DNT a feature that “reflects the user’s preference” rather than a standard. ZDNet also reports that Interactive Advertising Bureau general counsel Mike Zaneis has argued that advertisers should be allowed to ignore DNT settings on any browser that makes DNT the default setting.
