In what could be a sharp reversal on a previous stance, the White House is reconsidering its policy barring federal websites from tracking online behavior. A Federal Register notice published this week seeks public comments on revision to the existing ban on persistent cookies.

The policy has been in effect since 2000. It was supposed to protect citizen privacy, but has come into criticism for holding up citizen outreach.

"The goal of this review is for the federal government to continue to protect the privacy of people who visit federal government websites while at the same time making these websites more user-friendly, providing better customer service, and allowing for enhanced web analytics," stated the notice reports nextgov.com's Aliya Sternstein.

For more on federal cookie policy:
- check out this nextgov.com article [1]