Thrilled to publish my latest article

BAN COOKIE BANNERS: A CASE STUDY IN TECH REGULATION

with the Harv. J. of Law & Tech!

A cri de cล“ur to end this worse-than-useless regulatory compliance regime and let something that actually protects users take its place.

papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=6380462
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March 19, 2026 - 18:18 UTC

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cookie banners exist because companies lobbied to make "consent" mean a 47-option dropdown. ban the banners, sure. but the tracking they laundered through those banners? that's still happening either way.
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Yes. The article says thatโ€ฆ
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The tragedy of the cookie banner is that it embodies the best intentions but worst solutionism of modern regulation: the fantasy that complex problems such as digital surveillance can be solved by forcing individuals to click "I agree."

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The regulations do not mandate bad UX. Bad UX was the industry's malevolent response, an act of war against governments.
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I am a fan of specific examples to vividly illustrate absurdity

So #ICYMI

>The judge held while the [web and app activity] button might create an expectation among users that data will not be collected, such expectation is insufficient to give rise to a contract.
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At best, this has produced a regime of performative compliance that neither informs users nor limits data exploitation & degrades internet usability. But at worst, it has crowded out more substantive reforms by offering the illusion of protection while leaving surveillance capitalism intact

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Reading with interest. โ€œcookie banners should be abolishedโ€ Iโ€™m no fan of cookie banners - Iโ€™d like to abolish the business model that requires them :)
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Cookie banners are the epitome of malicious compliance
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Iโ€™m dying!
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I see a lot of suggestions for privacy protections that would be better than cookie banners. All for them.

I don't think we should ban cookie banners first and hope for privacy protection later. (I didn't see anything in the paper saying this explicitly but got that impression, maybe mistakenly)
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tell me one privacy protection that cookie banners gives us
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And all the countless PRIVACY POLICY disclaimers they ask me to sign, saying I've been given a copy, when I never.
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If we ban cookie banners, how will we know what the Girl Scouts are doing at that table with those boxes?

Didnโ€™t think of THAT, did you??
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Curious to read, but a bit suspicious of framing. Cookie banners being born out of EU regulations is a classic industry spin, and itโ€™s unfortunate to also find it here. Many EU scholars like myself think of cookie banners as malicious compliance, most of which are already banned. Will read closely
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How are cookie banners _not_ born out of EU regulations? Would they exist if the relevant EU regulations (ePrivacy directive, GDPR) didn't?
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I am very aware. I unpack all of that and the role industry compliance capture played.
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Reviewed this in detail. Incredible writing, but my concerns were confirmed. The article is a good description of the American scholarly view of EU law, but not of EU law itself. The article's pressure is also misplaced. If you share your e-mail in PM, I'm happy to share more detailed feedback.
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Would have liked to read
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Please can we also ban U.S.-based web sites from displaying petulant "This content is not available in your region for legal reasons" messages to European visitors?
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๐ŸŽถdid you ever know that youโ€™re my hero๐ŸŽถ
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Ahhhh, a paper whose time has come! Congratulations and thank you!
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I have gone to Google settings many times to turn off the popup asking me when I go to websites on Safari to sign into a website with my Google account. If I didn't use You Tube I would cancel my account. There is no way Apple couldn't block this; Google has to know its setting doesn't stay set.
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Yesssssss sickos love 2 C it !!!
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I like that clicking though to the article gives me a cookie banner
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And a captcha to verify you are human before you even get to the cookie banner. Thatโ€™s the Chefโ€™s Kiss ๐Ÿ˜™
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Somebody had to say it - thank you.
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I got a cookie banner when I tried to read your article.
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I would love to see cookie banners go away. Most especially because they're all different and many are structured to get people to inadvertently give consent through deceptive design patterns.
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๐Ÿ’ฏ
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This is an extremely informative article! Thanks so much for sharing!
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