Has Phorm Gone Too Far?

So what happens when your ISP realizes that the information it’s carrying from Web servers to end users is inherently valuable? UK based Phorm recently revealed products enabling ISPs to capitalize on their respective goldmines of consumer data by selling it to advertisers for behavioral targeting purposes. They succeeded in negotiating deals with three of Britain’s’ largest ISPs (BT, Carphone Warehouse and Virgin Media), which effectively provide broadband service to 70% of all British households. While Phorm maintains that consumer privacy is protected and their service has provisions for end-users to opt out; journalists, bloggers and satirists are voicing their concerns.

My previous posts indicate that I am a strong proponent of onsite tracking and the ability to create greater relevance and a stronger user experience for Web site visitors based on clickstream data. The key emphasis here is greater benefits for the end user. These benefits include:

saving time (by remembering information),
increasing relevance (by recognizing the context of the visit) and,
improving the site (by optimizing pages based on aggregated actions).

JupiterResearch shows that consumers explicitly stated they do not want more advertising. This sentiment exposes a distinction between onsite targeting specific to user actions and behavioral targeting at large, generally used for advertising purposes. The realist in me concedes that I am powerless to stop advertising, so it might as well be targeted for me based on my online actions. Yet, I do feel as if I have some control over what ads I see based on the Web sites I choose to visit, knowing that they are monitoring my actions.

I believe that Phorm is overstepping it bounds by using infrastructure to capture everything that users do online and selling that information for a profit to anyone who cares to target them. In my mind, the frightening precedent-setting issue is that infrastructure companies will now have the ability to alter the experience for end users. In this way, sites that subscribe to the Phorm technology can use completely unrelated information about my online habits in attempts to sell me products or services online. Or worse yet, find out things about me that no single site would ever know and draw conclusions about my personal life.

Examples abound in the medical world, and potential exposure from security breaches or misuse of data could threaten job seekers or public figures. Creator of the World Wide Web, Sir Tim Berners-Lee told BBC News that he did not want his ISP to track which websites he visited.

"I want to know if I look up a whole lot of books about some form of cancer that that's not going to get to my insurance company and I'm going to find my insurance premium is going to go up by 5% because they've figured I'm looking at those books," he said.

I agree that ISP should not have the right to mine customers’ clickstream data, create a comprehensive picture of their actions, preferences and behavior and profit from it in ways that the consumer doesn’t condone or even have any awareness about.

This analogy may be a bit of a stretch, but imagine what could happen when infrastructure monitoring is extended to the offline world. Will the bundled services provider I use which brings Internet, telephone and TV to my home started mining my personal data? Perhaps I make a number of calls to Florida in a given month, will I begin seeing advertisements on TV promoting travel to Florida? What if one infrastructure company starts selling my data to another? Will we get to a point where I flip a light switch in my home and must wait for a pre-roll advertisement to play for low-cost airfare to Florida before I can see well enough to find the toothpaste? What if when I flush my toilet an audio ad for Charmin plays over my home sound system that is delivered wirelessly through my network? These examples may be far-fetched, but they are not too far outside the realm of possibility.

So what’s the solution? I’ll reiterate what I’ve stated in the past regarding personalization and privacy: consumers must be given a choice. Controls need to be in place to enable consumers to opt out of targeting tactics, stop unwanted solicitations and control the information that sites have about them. Consumer privacy is a delicate issue and we’re living in an age where dubious privacy practices abound. It will only take a single breach of online privacy to send the advocates, bloggers and satirists into a tirade. For now, I’d like to help educate the masses about the benefits and realities of targeting and empower consumers to make their own choices.

Behavioral Targeting Does Attract Attention

The New York Times published a second article today regarding pending legislation to regulate tracking of online behavior using analytics tools. The story centered on a bill submitted by a NY assemblyman, and suggested “there ought to be a law…that would make it a crime for certain Web companies to use personal information about consumers for advertising without their consent”. This sentiment runs parallel with the previous story (by the same reporter) that cited 9 customer advocacy groups petitioning for Do Not Track lists.

So, lawmakers are now playing catch-up to Internet practices that have been in place for years. The unfounded fear is that ‘you know too much about me and will entice me to spend money on your products’. C’mon. In essence, haven’t salesmen and marketers been attempting to do this for the last century? Size up your customer and sell them what you can. The Web allows us to interact with an environment that is infinitely measurable…And now you want to take that away? Privacy concerns considered, I think these legislatures have an uphill battle in front of them. Advertising has always been an intrusive process. Stop people from what they’re doing, get their attention and say something memorable. If tracking enables that in a more relevant manner, I say -- good for advertising. If you don’t like it, ignore the ads (and don't worry…they’re used to it).

A Do Not Track List?

Yesterday’s New York Times article and subsequent banter regarding heightened privacy concerns over Web analytics monitoring indicated that nine groups have petitioned the FTC to implement “Do Not Track” (DNT) lists. What ever happened to deleting cookies? Wait, what about simply blocking sites from dropping a cookie with your Web browser? But I question what these nine groups are so worried about anyway. The benefits of Web analytics tracking are widely appreciated by consumers, yet the collection process gives them the creeps. What’s that…You want your cake and would like to eat it too?

For all those groups wanting DNT lists, do you also take offense when your local shopkeeper greets you by name and asks if you would like “the usual”? Or informs you that the blueberry muffins just came out of the oven and are still warm? Do you scour when your local bank teller welcomes you back by name and asks if you’re having a good day? I don’t know about you, but I visit my local bank’s Web site 10-times more frequently than I walk into a branch. If the site is able to make my life easier by anticipating my needs and providing relevant offers for me, which in turn saves me time, I say bring it on. I can still choose to ignore it if I like, but thanks for keeping it relevant. Further, I have my bank Web site, news sites, weather info and frequently visited pages all customized the way I like them. I can consume information faster and more efficiently than ever before thanks to analytics tracking. And just maybe those ads served with some semblance of my interests will alert me to something that I wasn’t aware of previously.

We live in a society where advertising is a constant droll in the background. You can tune in if you like or allow it to fade to white noise. In my experience, I tune in when something is relevant to me and that’s good for advertising. There are plenty of online habits that foster and even encourage dubious privacy practices (think Facebook, MySpace, Flickr, etc), behavioral targeting isn’t going to ruin the Internet. I posted in jest “Should I be Worried” because Google knows too much about me. But until the privacy can-o-worms is opened through some sort of “Digital Chernobyl”, whereby an individual is denied service, rights, or entitlement due to his/her Internet habits, I think we’re all safe for the moment.

PS> Your visit to this site was tracked, aggregated, recorded and preserved for all time using Web analytics software ;)

There Are No Online Coincidences

I did some shopping this past weekend for flat screen teevees. Claiming ignorance on the entire television revolution, my main goal was to begin the research process and attain some education on what’s available. I visited my local electronics store to check out the picture quality and attempted to view multiple screens at once to determine which had superior colors and clarity. I was helped by a young but knowledgeable salesperson, who provided some basic information. Yet, the real research began at home when I visited numerous sites (e.g., Digital Advisor, Cnet, lcdbuyingguide.com, NewEgg.com) offering reviews, rankings and recommendations for my soon-to-be new household appliance.

The next day I logged into Facebook and was somewhat surprised to see a wall posting inviting me to sign up to win a 52” Samsung LCD tv. Samsung was one of the brands that I was considering but the big 52” was outside my budget, so I figured that I might as well sign up for the sweepstakes to see if could win one. I navigated from the landing page through the site to get more info and found myself trapped, with no navigation to the sweepstakes page and no back option. I revisited Facebook and clicked the link again only to have it timeout with a page failure. I repeated the process twice with recurring failures and noted that the page timed out because ads from DoubleClick failed to render. Despite the poor navigation and failed page loads, I still made my way back to the site to volunteer my personal information to Samsung on the thin hope that I might be the lucky winner of that teevee. They got me…but at a price that I was willing to pay for the promise of the teevee version of Ed McMahon knocking at my door.

So the behavioral targeting worked for me, but got me thinking that there are really no more coincidences on the Web. With ubiquitous technologies like Google and DoubleClick, all of my actions and behavior is catalogued and used – for me/against me; take your pick – at a later time. Despite the fact that this conjures up some irksome feelings of privacy invaded and innocence lost …the tactic worked. So like it or hate it, targeting is effective. But the next time someone tells you that they couldn’t believe what a coincidence it was that they discovered such-and-such online – you can offer a wry smile and enlighten them to the ways of the Web. It’s all planned and they’re working us like marionettes.

PostScript: stay tuned and I’ll tell you about the teevee we buy. Have you experienced any online “coincidences” as a result of behavioral targeting?

Should I be worried?

Google knows a lot about me. Let’s start with the copious daily searches for everything from analytics research to stocking stuffers. I use Googlemaps for driving directions to every new location that I visit. My personal blogs are created and maintained on Blogger. They’re tagged with Google Analytics. My iGoogle tab opens each time I launch a new browser with content specific to my interests. My inbox buzzes hourly with Google Alerts on companies that I track. I’ve watched dozens of videos on YouTube. Several years worth of personal emails were sent and received via Gmail to friends, family, colleagues, and every word is archived for easy retrieval.

Now that the FTC approved Google’s acquisition of DoubleClick, will my digital world become a bullseye for targeted advertising?

WCM and the promise of Web 2.0

This week was Web Content Management (WCM) week in Boston, with a kick-off on Monday at the CM Pros conference, followed by two days of the Gilbane Conference & technology showcase. The general tenor of the event made for great networking and included interesting keynotes, lively vendor discussion and industry expert sessions. All of which included a healthy dose of forward-looking statements.

The widespread impact of Web 2.0, from both an end-user and user-contributor perspective, was a recurring theme throughout the conference. I took it upon myself to dig beyond the 2.0 buzz to determine the practical influence that new technologies will have on the user’s experience and the way content is delivered. Here is what I came up with…

• Alerting – certainly a familiar technology today, which will increasingly be used in new and innovative ways. Take for example Facebook’s Beacon. A failed attempt, but nonetheless a feature that uses events as triggers to automate notification. Retailers are adopting alerts as merchandising tactics and we can only expect to see more as consumers are looking for a push of relevant information.

• Community – the dependence on social networks is strengthening daily as users spend more time using the tools and features within their social arenas. Communities are important as social networks, but will also begin to permeate the workforce as collaboration tools. With a distributed workforce becoming the norm and growing familiarity with social networking tools, it’s not long before employees are asking for Facebook-style tools for internal collaboration. Organizations will be forced to embrace these technologies and build solutions around them – or risk losing their talent to those who do.

• Open APIs – Google maps is certainly the most utilized API, since geography helps us to attach relevance to everything we do. Services like Zillow have brought the mash-up to new levels of usability and “coolness”, with a high functionality after bite. With mash-ups as a hot topic in many discussions at the conference, we can expect to see more of them. Yet, “openness” is a concept that 2.0 functionality is built upon and will maintain a key role in the ongoing development of cutting edge technology.

• Relevance – don’t give me everything, just give me what I need – and hurry up. I don’t know about you, but my world is full of too much unwanted information. I’m willing to provide some details about my personal preferences in order to place filters on the information that comes my way. Web Content Management systems are doing their part by enabling dynamic content powered by behavioral targeting, analytics and community influences. While governance remains a critical component to my privacy (thanks Amazon for not giving up our purchase histories), predictive analysis and relevance will severely impact the way that we interact with the web.

My Computer Doesn’t Know Me Anymore

So what happens when personalized web promotions or on-site behavioral targeting tactics miss the mark? Technologies designed to improve the online experience by making it more relevant based on user interactions and predictive modeling can have negative repercussions leading to frustration and abandonment when assumptions are false.

I started thinking about these technological miscalculations when my Uncle explained that his Netflix account persistently recommended foreign films based on selections he made upon initiating his membership. He likened the recommendations to unwanted advances from a foreign temptress and has been anonymously patronizing his local Blockbuster ever since. Granted, Netflix offers several methods for customers to refine preferences and continues to hone in on a users’ specific taste through ratings and explicit information requests. However, we as humans are inherently lazy, and often times a laborious process of correction is more than we wish to invest, especially for the casual user. While Netflix is arguably leading the market in terms of allowing users to refine their interests and making effective collaborative recommendations, other methods of targeting are more difficult to correct, especially for non-savvy web users.

Take for example my Mom; years ago she diligently researched her doctoral thesis on minorities in education by venturing to numerous online and offline sources covering diversity, multi-culturalism and blacks. After some time she began to receive emails offering Black Education Journals and other periodicals at no charge. In this case the targeting was correct in identifying her interests and she accepted the offers, but the implicit assumptions of my Mom’s ethnicity were wrong. So, when subsequent emails started to arrive inviting her to join black singles networks, the targeting couldn’t have been further off base. The problem was that my Mom had no recourse for correcting the profile of her online self and still receives off-target emails and misdirected online promotions to this day.

In my own experience, I was issued a company laptop that previously belonged to another employee. Upon my first several Google searches, I was puzzled by the fact that all of my results were coming up from the UK. I was accessing the site through a North American IP address, yet after numerous searches Google was determined to prioritize UK results. I attempted to correct the situation using Google’s interface, but at that time found no course of action to inform the site that I was in the US and seeking US-based information. Try as I might, there was no correcting the problem and eventually I deleted my cookies (against my analytics-induced nature) and acquiesced to starting anew.

So, the moral of this series of observations is that sites providing personalized or targeted content must also provide a way out. Do this by offering methods for visitors to explicitly state preferences and by empowering visitors with clear messaging on how to turn off or modify behavioral targeting. In an age where tuning out unwanted advertising and content is increasingly prevalent, don’t you want to accurately target those that are listening?