Join us Dec. 1-3 in Nashville for the Digiday Programmatic Marketing Summit
This article is a WTF explainer, in which we break down media and marketing’s most confusing terms. More from the series →
Tracking pixels have been a digital marketing fixture for years. And yet they’ve largely stood in the shadow of the third-party cookie, despite their similar tracking capabilities.
Tracking pixels are effectively tiny, invisible images that can be embedded in web pages and emails and used to collect information, such as a device’s IP address, as covered in the video below. Earlier this year, ad security monitoring company Confiant discovered an ad tech company using tracking pixels as part of a fingerprinting ploy that co-opted IAB Europe’s Transparency and Consent Framework.
Imperceptible as tracking pixels may be, they have garnered the attention of companies like Apple and Mozilla. The former’s Mail Privacy Protection feature blocks tracking pixels from loading in emails, which has posed a threat to email marketers. Meanwhile, both Apple and Mozilla provide options in their web browsers to similarly block tracking pixels on web pages.
More in Marketing
Amid growing tension over workplace AI, agencies have a window to reimagine staffing
AI agents are becoming common among agencies, but most companies haven’t grasped their potential to reshape teams.
From Celsius to Maybelline, more brands are lining up for the NYC Marathon’s 50th anniversary
The brands showing up at the annual race represent a more diverse cross-section of retail than ever before.
Future of Marketing Briefing: SharkNinja’s McLaren deal treats F1 fandom as the asset
What SharkNinja;s McLaren deal says about the new price of F1 fandom.