Privacy, fraud, and other concerns may loom but the third party data industry had a great 2018, growing by 17.5% over the previous year, according to a Winterberry Group study for the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB). Total spending on data and solutions was nearly $19.2 billion. Data management solutions, which includes Customer Data Platforms, grew by 25% to just under $5.0 billion. Download for details.

Oh wait – what about hacks at tech-savvy Amazon, Facebook, Equifax, and so many more? You can add Quora to the list: “approximately 100 million” Quora users’ data was compromised including name, email address, and public comments, the company said yesterday. They’re “very sorry for any concern or inconvenience this may cause.”

Procrastinators of the world can throw a party whenever they get around to it: Google has once more pushed back complete third-party cookie deprecation.  The new target is “early next year.” Reasons for the delay include concerns expressed by U.K. data regulator Information Commissioner’s Office, an ongoing inquiry by the U.K. Competition and Markets Authority, and widespread discontent in the advertising ecosystem.