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New profiles attach names to browsing habits
By Doug Bedell / Staff Writer of The Dallas Morning News
Published 02-10-2000
Click here for a printer-friendly version of this story
The Internet's largest banner advertising company,DoubleClick, has
raised a firestorm of protest after revelationsthat its new profiling
methods can track Web surfers and matchthem to name, address and other
personal data.
DoubleClick has collected information on browsing habits forseveral
years using cookies, text files that make navigating any ofthe 11,
500 Web sites on its ad network easier.
Information collected has included the make of a user's browser,
Internet address, language spoken and sites visited. Such data havebeen
used to target individuals for specialized ad campaigns. Thecompany'
s privacy policy guaranteed the data would remainanonymous.
But that was before DoubleClick's $1.7 billion purchase of the
massmarketing research firm Abacus Direct, giving it access to adatabase
of more than 2 billion consumer catalog transactions.Usatoday.com
reported late last month that DoubleClick had begunmarketing partnerships
with 1,500 Web sites that ask users tovolunteer more personal details.
Only about a dozen sites areparticipating, the company says. It refuses
to divulge theiridentities.
The company says only people who voluntarily provide personalinformation
to one of the participating sites could be tracked byname. Once that
information is provided, however, movements wouldbe recorded through
any of the sites carrying DoubleClick ads andwould provide tracking
data.
Now, the company says, anyone who does not want tracking to occurmust
"opt out" of the process using a page deep in the DoubleClicksite
(www.doubleclick.net/optout/default.asp) to change theidentifying
cookie in a user's browser.
"DoubleClick is absolutely committed to protecting the privacy
ofall Internet users," a company news release says. "Unlessspecifically
disclosed to the contrary in a Web site's privacypolicy, most nonpersonally
identifiable information collected byDoubleClick from Web sites on
the DoubleClick Network is includedin the Abacus Online database.
"However, the Abacus Online database will not associate anypersonally
identifiable medical, financial or sexual preferenceinformation with
an individual. Neither will it associateinformation from children."
But the potential for abuse has incensed privacy advocates,prompted
a call for e-mail protests and spawned at least onelawsuit.
"For years, DoubleClick told the public that cookies do notidentify
them personally," says Jason Catlett, president of theJunkbusters
privacy group.
"But now they are saying they will identify people on an 'opt-out'
basis, which isn't permission.
"Privacy groups will petition the FTC [Federal Trade Commission]
tostop this deceptive practice, as we previously warned DoubleClickthat
we would if they attempted this."
Junkbusters, Electronic Privacy Information Center and other groupssay
they planned to file the complaint by Wednesday.
The Center for Democracy and Technology, an advocate for publicpolicies
that advance constitutional civil liberties and democraticvalues in
new computer and communications technologies, is urgingpeople to e-
mail their protests to DoubleClick's CEO and 60 of thecompany's clients.
Those clients include AltaVista, Ask Jeeves,AuctionWatch, Blue Mountain
Arts, Drkoop.com, Hewlett-Packard,Kozmo.com, Network Solutions and
The New York Times.
The sites are not necessarily involved in furnishing DoubleClickwith
the registration rolls it needs to link once-anonymous cookiesto names,
addresses, phone numbers and catalog purchases.
Meanwhile, a lawsuit was filed in California Superior Court onbehalf
of a woman who is seeking to curb DoubleClick dataretrieval.
Late last year before the DoubleClick-Abacus Direct transaction,
privacy advocates sent an open letter to managers of six mutualfunds,
asking them not to invest in the online advertising network.
The advocacy groups also held meetings with FTC commissioners todiscuss
the merger and possible restraints on the onlineadvertising industry.
Mr. Catlett and others say the potential for privacy invasionrivaled
that of Intel's aborted plans to have each of its PentiumIII processors
automatically broadcast a unique serial number asusers surf the Internet.
"This merger is the most dangerous assault against anonymity on
theInternet since the Intel Processor Serial Number," Mr. Catlett
saidat the time.
"By synchronizing cookies with name and address from e-mail,registrations
and e-commerce transactions, the merged company wouldhave a surveillance
database of Orwellian proportions."
Staff writer Doug Bedell can be contacted by writing dbedell@dallasnews.com.
ILLUSTRATION(S): (Knight Ridder Tribune Media Services) Internet surfer.
© 2000 The Dallas Morning News All Rights Reserved