The FTC is taking an interest in the way Adobe’s Flash installs its tracking cookies, according to a report by Paid Content. Privacy advocates have been arguing that the Adobe Flash Player, which is intaledl on about 98 percent of PCs around the world, does not allow standard privacy controls to delete its Flash cookies. Critics argue that when users use privacy controls to stop cookies being set, or delete existing cookies, that this function works for all other apps and plug-ins except for Flash.
The FTC has opened the matter to public comment over the next two months. In response Adobe has said that its local shared objects, what Adobe calls Falsh cookies, were not designed for tracking purposes. An Adobe spokesperson also said that Adobe does not stand for any tracking that takes place against a user’s wishes.
Adobe also stated that the latest version of Google Chrome allows users to control Flash cookies from within the browser’s privacy controls. However, Mozilla’s Firefox or Microsoft’s Internet Explorer do not currently support the removal of Flash cookies.
