In the News - Phorm

Amazon opts out of controversial targeted-advertising technology

The UK's largest e-commerce company, Amazon.co.uk has said it has opted out of the Phorm system - a controversial technology which allows internet service providers to track a user's internet activity in order to give them more targeted advertising. Phorm needs companies like Amazon to sign up so they can gather the data to build the system.

Privacy campaigners asked Amazon, Google, Bebo, Facebook and Yahoo to opt out of Phorm. Bebo and Google are considering their positions.

Yesterday the European Commission started legal case against the UK government over whether Phorm broke EU privacy laws when it tested its system with BT without customer consent in 2006 and 2007.

Phorm insists internet users will be able to opt out of the system and that it is more secure than the current method for targeting advertising: search-engine's storing internet history in the form of cookies.

Meanwhile, privacy campaigners continue to be concerned about the launch of Google's Streetview service in the UK ('In the News' on 20 Mar 09)

(Sources: Guardian.co.uk, MyCustomer.com)

Posted by Plebble Admin at 09:46 on 16-Apr-2009