How to Honor GPC in Google Tag Manager
Tag Manager has no built-in Global Privacy Control variable. Here is how to read the signal, set a consent default before any other trigger runs, and require consent on the tags that sell or share.
How-to guides
Step-by-step implementation: detecting and honoring opt-out signals, and testing what fires before a visitor chooses.
8 articles, newest first
How to Check What Fires Before a Visitor Consents
A DevTools walkthrough for finding out which trackers your own site contacts before a visitor touches your consent interface: the exact steps, what a failure looks like on the wire, and the false negatives a manual check quietly produces.
How to Honor the GPC Signal: A Practical Guide
Honoring Global Privacy Control means three things: read the signal, suppress the sale and sharing that follows, and say so on the page. Here is how each one lands in Google Tag Manager, in server-side code, and in a consent platform.
The Sec-GPC Header Explained: Request to Response
GPC travels two ways at once: a Sec-GPC request header and a navigator.globalPrivacyControl property in JavaScript. Here is what each one carries, what a correct response from your site looks like, and what the .well-known resource is for.
GPC Not Working on Your Site? Debug It in Order
GPC failures are rarely mysterious. They cluster into a short list of causes, and that list has a reliable order. Work it top to bottom: the browser, the cache, the tag manager, the consent rules, then the tags nobody routed through the consent layer.
Which Browsers Send the GPC Signal in 2026
GPC is not a niche extension setting any more. Some browsers send it by default, some ship a toggle, some need an extension. Here is where each one stands, how to confirm yours is sending it, and why the share of traffic carrying the signal keeps climbing.
Governing law
The provisions these articles turn on, with the text and a plain-language summary of each.
Earlier in how-to guides
April 20261 article
February 20261 article
More topics
- Enforcement6CalPrivacy and Attorney General actions, broken down by what regulators cited and what it means for a live website.
- Compliance guides9What the CCPA, CPRA, and neighboring California laws require, explained in plain language with the statute cited.
- CMP blind spots2Where a consent platform's configuration and a site's production behavior drift apart, and how to verify it independently.
- Research & case studies2Original benchmarks and audits built from real scans, with the methodology published alongside the numbers.
Put it to work
Test your own site's Global Privacy Control handling
The free check sends a real GPC signal to one URL and shows whether marketing trackers stop. The full audit runs free from our homepage with no account; paying unlocks its evidence.