This Browser Cookie Tracks Your Every Digital Footstep
Here is a Web browser cookie you might not want to bite into.
A company called Phorm is working with British Internet service providers to plant super cookies, of sorts, that are capable of tracking every single Web site you visit. Data collected will be used to better display ads to U.K. Web surfers. Privacy activists are in a tizzy about the plan, stating the breach of privacy is abhorrent and warn U.S. ISPs are the next new market for Phorm's technology.
Phorm Gussies Up its Wikipedia Entry
Phorm says its cookies track people's Web whereabouts anonymously and that nobody is identified ? therefore it's not violating anyone's online privacy. Phorm was so concerned the world might get the wrong impression it decided to edit its own Phorm Wikipedia entry. ? a move that has directed even more criticism toward the company.
Wikipedia has since reversed the edits, but you can see the specific changes here. Phorm admitted that it did change the Wikipedia telling The Register, "We wanted to clarify a number of inaccuracies in the Wikipedia entry on Phorm."
AOL came under intense scrutiny for its anonymous data collection practices that turned out to be not so anonymous in 2006. And if you're thinking that a service like Phorm's would never fly here in the U.S. think again. A company called NebuAd is already working with U.S. ISPs to delivering a similar ad technology.
How Phorm Works
Cookies, as we all know, are little bits of computer code that specific Web sites plant on your PC so they can remember you when you return to their site. This is helpful for logging back onto Amazon.com and seeing the contents of your shopping cart right where you left them. In the end Web browser cookies serve as a reference point for one Web site to get information about your browsing history with only that specific Web site.
Phorm is under the privacy magnifying glass because it has developed a method to use cookies to track every single site you visit and use it for advertising.
ISPs will use Phorm's technology to plant a Phorm cookie on its customers computers that will "talk" to other cookies that Web sites plant on your computer. Now when you visit any Web site the information is passed onto the Phorm cookie. Naturally Phorm can use this data to better understand your likes and dislikes so it can display relevant online ads.
Phorm exists as a sort of privacy firewall between you and your ISP. Of course your ISP knows everything you do online. But if ISPs started pairing that information with your Web movements and then showing you ads they'd have a consumer privacy revolt on their hands. Not to mention the Federal Trade Commission would likely want to talk to them about its business practices. Technologies such as Phorn's allows ISPs to filter out names, addresses, and personal information and then show them ads.
Maybe I'm just quick to see the big picture, but companies that don't participate in questionable actions and services generally don't have to worry about the PR nightmare that usually accompanies said actions.
Phorm is working with British Telecom, Virgin Media and TalkTalk Internet. It's also reportedly in talks with ISPs here in the U.S.
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Some companies seem to forget that it's their customers that keep them in business. With the shabby way Nero treats its' customers, I imagine it won't take long for their company's value to decline dramatically.