{"id":3882,"date":"2022-06-28T07:49:16","date_gmt":"2022-06-28T07:49:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/2022\/06\/28\/italy-becomes-the-latest-country-to-ban-google-analytics\/"},"modified":"2025-06-16T07:11:30","modified_gmt":"2025-06-16T07:11:30","slug":"italy-becomes-the-latest-country-to-ban-google-analytics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/2022\/06\/28\/italy-becomes-the-latest-country-to-ban-google-analytics\/","title":{"rendered":"Italy Becomes the Latest Country to Ban Google Analytics"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span class=\"lead\">Austria appears to have set off a wave of European countries looking to ban the use of Google Analytics, as Italy becomes the fourth country to declare Google Analytics illegal after Austria, Holland and France.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-17808\" src=\"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/Brace-Yourselves.jpeg\" alt=\"Brace Yourself\"><\/p>\n<p>A trend is beginning to emerge:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>December 2021 \u2013 Austria declare Google Analytics illegal<\/li>\n<li>January 2022 \u2013 Holland declare Google Analytics illegal<\/li>\n<li>February 2022 \u2013 France declares Google Analytics illegal<\/li>\n<li>June 2022 \u2013 Italy declare Google Analytics illegal<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2><strong>Why?<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>The main bugbear amongst these European data protection authorities is the transferring of personal data to the United States.<\/p>\n<p>Google Analytics transfers the following data:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Device IP address<\/li>\n<li>Browser information<\/li>\n<li>Operating System (OS)<\/li>\n<li>Screen resolution<\/li>\n<li>Language selection<\/li>\n<li>The date and time of the site visit<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>All of this data is supplied without adequate supplementary measures to raise the level of protection to the necessary EU legal standard. The lack of protection around the data being sent to the US directly goes against the protection set out by GDPR.<\/p>\n<p>In addition to that, American law means Google is obliged to disclose data to U.S. intelligence services if requested \u2013 including European citizens. As you can imagine, this is a big no-no in the eyes of the EU. Thus the mass banning of Google Analytics begins\u2026<\/p>\n<h2><strong>Is it possible to use Google Analytics legally?<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>Technically yes, but in practice not really.<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-style: normal !msorm;\"><em>\u201c<\/em><\/span><span style=\"font-style: normal !msorm;\"><em>The CNIL\u2019s (France) guidance suggests only very narrow possibilities for EU-based site owners to use Google\u2019s Analytics tool legally: <\/em><\/span><\/p>\n<ol>\n<li><span style=\"font-style: normal !msorm;\"><em>Apply additional encryption where keys are held under the exclusive control of the data exporter itself or other entities established in a territory offering an adequate level of protection.<\/em><\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-style: normal !msorm;\"><em>Use a proxy server to avoid direct contact between the user\u2019s terminal and Google\u2019s servers.\u201d<\/em><\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p>However, Austria\u2019s stance appears to be even stricter, and the Austrian data protection authority (Garante) goes on to state that:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><em>Data encryption won\u2019t solve the problems as Google still holds the keys to this encryption, therefore they can still access the data if they so choose to.<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>Anonymising data is also not a viable solution as there is no way to prove this is done <strong>before<\/strong> the data is sent to Google in the US.<\/em><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>To add insult to injury \u2013 as of now there is also no legal agreement between the EU and US, therefore the future is not looking great.<\/p>\n<p>It is worth pointing out that Google Analytics is not the only tool suffering from this issue. However, they are by far the largest and they might be being used as an example\/warning to other companies.<\/p>\n<h2><strong>Will GA4 solve the problem? <\/strong><\/h2>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/2022\/03\/17\/google-set-to-retire-universal-analytics-in-2023\/\">Google Analytics 3 will be sunset in 2023<\/a> and there is a big push toward the \u2018privacy-centric\u2019 <a href=\"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/2020\/10\/16\/google-analytics-4-what-is-it-and-what-does-it-mean\/\">GA4<\/a>. So you could be mistaken in thinking that GA4 will solve the problem, however, this is not necessarily the case. Google has taken the following steps:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>GA4 will process all data from end devices within the EU on servers in the EU.<\/li>\n<li>GA4 processes IP addresses for geo-location, but no longer stores IP addresses.<\/li>\n<li>GA4 allows the deactivation of Google Signals to prevent linking with Google accounts.<\/li>\n<li>GA4 allows the configuration of the granularity of collected geo and device data (e.g. screen resolution requiring consent).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>The new changes are welcome, however, it is still unclear if these changes are sufficient enough for the EU.<\/p>\n<p>There are a number of features that would need to be turned off to get GA4 100% compliant, but this would come at a loss of data accuracy and functionality. Therefore this is something to consider in the future.<\/p>\n<h2><strong>So, what now?<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>It\u2019s almost impossible to run Google Analytics legally according to the EU, and any legal framework around this is still very far away.<\/p>\n<p>Google Analytics as it stands is still legal in the UK, however, our advice would be to watch this space \u2013 European countries are banning Google Analytics at an alarming rate.<\/p>\n<p>More and more users are demanding privacy, therefore for those in the countries affected, consider removing Google Analytics from your website and exploring other options where you are in control of the data \u2013 there are a number of options out there\u00a0and we can help!<\/p>\n<p><strong>If you need help adapting your <a href=\"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/services\/digital-strategy\/analytics\/\">web analytics<\/a> measurement <\/strong><strong>strategy, then please\u00a0<\/strong><strong>talk to one of our friendly experts <a href=\"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/contact\/\">today<\/a>.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Austria appears to have set off a wave of European countries looking to ban the use of Google Analytics, as Italy becomes the fourth country to declare Google Analytics illegal&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":3883,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[],"related_service":[58],"related_industry":[],"class_list":["post-3882","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-data-and-analytics"],"acf":[],"card":"<article class=\"wp-component-card wp-component-card--dark wp-component-card--resource wp-component-card--post wp-component-card--full-width            wp-component-card--link js-card-link\n        \">\n            <div class=\"wp-component-card__image\">\n            <img width=\"456\" height=\"566\" src=\"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/GDPR-EU.jpeg\" class=\"attachment-card-1-col size-card-1-col\" alt=\"EU GDPR\" decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" srcset=\"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/GDPR-EU.jpeg 456w, https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/GDPR-EU-242x300.jpeg 242w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 456px) 100vw, 456px\" \/>        <\/div>\n        <div class=\"wp-component-card__content\">\n        <div class=\"wp-component-card__content-top\">\n                                                    <p class=\"wp-component-card__eyebrow\">\n                    Blog                <\/p>\n                        <a href='https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/2022\/06\/28\/italy-becomes-the-latest-country-to-ban-google-analytics\/'>\n        <h2 class='wp-component-card__title'>\n            Italy Becomes the Latest Country to Ban Google Analytics\n        <\/h2>\n    <\/a>        <\/div>\n                    <div class=\"wp-component-card__content-bottom\">\n                                    <div class=\"wp-component-card__description wysiwyg\">\n                        Austria appears to have set off a wave of European countries looking to ban the use of Google Analytics, as Italy becomes the fourth country to declare Google Analytics illegal&hellip;                    <\/div>\n                                                                    <div class=\"wp-component-card__meta\">\n                                                    <p class=\"wp-component-card__date\">\n                                28 June 2022                            <\/p>\n                                                                            <div class=\"wp-component-card__terms\">\n                                                                                            <div class=\"wp-component-tags__tag\">\n                Analytics            <\/div>\n                                                                                                            <\/div>\n                                            <\/div>\n                                            <\/div>\n            <\/div>\n<\/article>\n","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3882","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/23"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3882"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3882\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3883"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3882"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3882"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3882"},{"taxonomy":"related_service","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/related_service?post=3882"},{"taxonomy":"related_industry","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/related_industry?post=3882"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}