• by Tony Silber , Staff Writer, December 20, 2021

Data protection and security top the priority list for media companies as they focus on first-party data, but their urgency has been diminished since Google announced in June that it is delaying its transition away from third-party cookies for a year.

Media innovators are seeking to get ahead of the curve anyway. One company, Axel Springer, the German media giant, is moving to enhance its first-party data and ensure its security as the world moves into the post-cookie and enhanced privacy era.

The company, whose brands include Bild, Welt, Insider (formerly Business Insider), and Politico, this week announced a partnership with the data-collaboration platform InfoSum to create the infrastructure for a post-cookie era. Using InfoSum’s technology, Axel Springer is adding another security layer on its data. It’s also providing a “non-movement of data” solution for data-sensitive customers, which enables companies to collaborate without their data ever having to leave their control, and without the risk of being shared with other parties.

Using the InfoSum platform, Axel Springer’s advertising clients will have the ability to securely use their first-party data to create tailored audience segments that can be activated across the company’s various media properties, all while prioritizing consumer privacy. Consumers, for their part, will be assured that both the media company and the tech provider meet the highest data protection and data security standards.

Carsten Schwecke, CEO of Axel Springer All Media, called the InfoSum technology a crucial building block for managing its own independent data stack.

“It was of great importance to us to find a technology that allows our partners and ourselves to keep control over their own first-party data,” Schwecke stated. “The InfoSum team convinced us, both technically and legally, and was able to bring a strong business approach to the table from the start. Especially in today’s digital world, trust is a high and important asset.”

InfoSum, based in Basingstoke, U.K., was founded in 2016 on the principle that it would help connect the world’s data without ever sharing it.

“We are seeing a global trend toward true customer data protection,” added InfoSum CEO Brian Lesser. “Consumers, governments, and regulators rightly expect there are better alternatives to the current outdated methods.”

Technology solutions should reinvent the notion of collaboration in an ecosystem that protects consumers and businesses, Lesser said. “This partnership with Axel Springer shows how everyone involved benefits from our technology, especially Axel Springer’s customers with new and exciting advertising products.”

And Uli Hegge, the InfoSum head of privacy and senior vice president for Central Europe, noted that having one of the largest global media companies play a pioneering role in the industry validates what InfoSum is doing.

Axel Springer is based in Berlin and employs more than 16,000 people worldwide.