I have no idea why, but yesterday I implemented P3P on my SEO training site. It validates, but I’m damned if I know why. The procedure was so convoluted and the instructions so tortuous that I had to read at least a dozen anguished posts in forums and trial-and-error to pass the validator. It is no wonder that the P3P page laments,
“Status: P3P Work suspended
After a successful Last Call, the P3P Working Group decided to publish the P3P 1.1 Specification as a Working Group Note to give P3P 1.1 a provisionally final state.
The P3P Specification Working Group took this step as there was insufficient support from current Browser implementers for the implementation of P3P 1.1.”
Is anyone in SEO circles bothering with P3P?
There used to be a small SEO advantage in using P3P by getting linked from the W3 list of compliant sites. That page has been replaced by privacyfinder.org however.
It’s still a good thing to have of course, even if only because creating and maintaining a policy forces you to put some effort into an area of your site that otherwise tends to be overlooked.