Phorm is planned to be rolled out soon
Tech giants asked to opt out of Phorm
/v3-uk/news/1953108/tech-giants-opt-phorm
24 Mar 2009, Rosalie Marshall , V3
The Open Rights Group has asked seven major technology firms to opt out of BT's Phorm in order to protect web users' privacy.
Phorm uses browsing information to serve accurately targeted advertisements. Its creators claim that data collected will be anonymous, but the technology has been the subject of widespread criticism and scrutiny by parliament because of its implications for personal privacy.
An open letter from the Open Rights Group addressed to the chief privacy officers at major web site providers states: "We strongly believe that it is clearly in your company's interest, it is in the interests of all of your customers, and it will serve to protect your brand's reputation, if you insist that the Phorm system does not process any data that passes to or from your web site."
The companies concerned are Microsoft, Google, Facebook, AOL, Yahoo, Amazon and eBay.
The Open Rights Group has argued that Phorm is illegal because it allows web communications to be intercepted without the informed consent of the sender and receiver. The organisation has also maintained that the technology is unlawful because BT is making copies of copyrighted material without permission.
In the letter, the group points organisations towards the ability for firms to opt out of Phorm by sending an email to Webwise.
"While we recognise that an opt-out is an entirely second-rate way of dealing with this problem, we would strongly urge you to take advantage of it in order to immediately reduce the risk of harm to your company and to your customers," added the letter.
Phorm is planned for a rollout in the near future under a Webwise brand by three UK internet service providers: BT, Virgin and TalkTalk.
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Do you agree?
Do you want ISPs to Use "every part" of Web Communications
That would be "ANY INFORMATION" flowing through their pipes, for their Own Business Profits!
I call this a type of "Anarchy"; project this to not just one ISP using these DPI systems for information gathering rather than just traffic management & then we have Information anarchy using Users/Websites/Businesses Intellectual Property & Commercially confidential data!
**It's BT Webwise"** no BBC Webwise; then wrong people will be getting complaints!
Posted by J D, 25 Mar 2009
Phorm & privacy
Phorm is only one more example of our society's increasingly rapid descent into a surveillance state. And government will do nothing about Phorm as they are too busy building up their own illegal databases. Boy! Did George Orwell get it right!!
Posted by James Wilkie, 25 Mar 2009
Unencryted comms have always been interceptable? Whats the difference?
When I first started using an internet browser, the first time I submitted some data over the internet, e.g. a in a search query, a pop up box came up saying something like 'The Data you are transmitting is unencrypted and may be read by a third party'. I gave consent my consent by ticking the box to say this is OK, submit my data don't warn me about this again. What is the problem then with phorm utilising this consent along with this information to give me targeted ads. I always knew and accepted, even assumed by default for security reasons, that any unencrypted data I sent could be intercepted. If I don't like this (e.g. for banking or credit card purchases) I simply ensure I use an encypted https connection. If phorm could intercept encrypted data, then that would big a privacy problem, but I don't believe that they can or would want to even try. How much of the tax payers money will now be spent fighting the EU lawyers over something I already gave consent for years ago the first time I ever did an internet search.
Posted by Mike Birtwistle, 15 Apr 2009
Not just Phorm
People would be shocked if they knew how much their governments and intelligence agenices knew about their online habits...
Posted by Concerned, 05 Feb 2010