LiveRamp integrated Qonsent’s consumer trust technology SmartQontract into its platform Authenticated Traffic Solution, giving brands a way to gain “explicit consent” to use customer data based on integrated permissions.

For consumers, the global partnership and integration provides a way to better understand how a brand plans to use their data and for how long.

“It’s a way for publishers and brands to explain the data exchange and get the right consent,” said Travis Clinger, SVP, Activations and Addressability, LiveRamp. “We feel that the next year of the internet will be driven by trusted value exchanges. To do that, every publisher and marketer will need technology to tell that story.”

The signals are passed through the LiveRamp platform. Consent requirements change per country. Through Qonsent, the publisher can customize and adhere to specific requirements.

“We’re excited about the technology behind the partnership and how publishers and brands can use the data,” Clinger said. “We see this as one of several partnerships to solve the challenge.”

Speaking from Madrid, Clinger said evolving requirements pose the biggest challenge.

“The laws are constantly evolving,” Clinger said, “GDPR has been in effect for five years and yet we are just now realizing in each market the true regulations. And then they change. … The law is being interpreted and marketers and publishers are having to react.”

Each website or interaction with a consumer must have a conversation with him or her to explain how the brand or publisher will use the data. The idea of dropping a cookie and collecting insights on a consumer and using them with a privacy policy are long gone, Clinger said.

Jesse Redniss, CEO and co-founder of Qonsent and long-time executive in the privacy sector, calls SmartQontract a “user experience” product.

He said change continues to challenge publishers and brands, but a turnkey technology like SmartQontract integrated with LiveRamp’s legal disclaimers focuses on data privacy and puts it directly in the interface. That allows consumers to determine if they want to share their personally identifiable information (PII) at the moment of consent for a variety of online actions such as during a purchase or downloading a document.

It’s important for consumers to clearly understand what they are agreeing to when it comes to personal data, Redniss said. Qonsent shares agreed-upon, hashed PII, such as emails, addresses, and phone numbers with LiveRamp. And does this without storing the hashed PII on its servers, LiveRamp shares encrypted RampID with brands and publishers for easy integrations and activations.