Google and Facebook dominate the online advertising business.
In their most recent quarterly reports, however, the two American Internet giants were in surprisingly different shape: While Google is doing brilliantly, the Facebook parent company Meta is suffering from tougher competition and stricter data rules on Apple cell phones.
Google is now pushing into this phase of weakness with a plan, similar to Apple, to make it more difficult to collect advertising-relevant users on devices with the Android operating system.
In this way, Google also wants to position itself as a guardian of privacy.
For the Internet company, however, this is a much greater balancing act.
After all, he earns his money primarily with online advertising and collects user data for this purpose.
In addition, he is already in the sights of cartel watchdogs, who accuse him of exploiting his dominant position in the advertising market.
That might explain why Google promises to be more cautious than Apple with its new data rules and also to develop them together with the companies that depend on advertising revenue.
Of course, these promises do not change the fact that Meta now has to fight on another front.