Blue Dreamer Blog
Written articles and my personal thoughts on web design, ecommerce, the internet and odd ramblings about life, the universe and everything!
Is your ISP using Phorm to spy on you?
BT, Virgin Media and TalkTalk ISP’s have teamed up with Phorm to implement a system that tracks your internet usage and display “targetted ads” to you on certain sites. Phorms origins are not exactly rosey, they used to be called 121Media and produced a browser toolbar that was nothing more than spyware (see Wikipedia on spyware). During 2006/2007 BT ran secret trials using their customers information without telling them.
How does Phorm work?
When you browse the web the system stores information about sites you visit and keeps a record of key words and phrases that those sites contain. They then put a cookie onto your machine which contains a unique UserID which it uses to cross reference your surfing habits, all of which are logged and kept for 14 days.
When you move from site to site your requests for web pages are intercepted while the Phorm system tries to match those words to display adverts that are relevent to the sort of things you’ve already been looking at. This also adds small delay to the destination site appearing while the information is being looked up and passed to the site you’re visiting.
You can see a technical explaination at The Register - How Phorm plans to tap your internet connection
The hard sell
According to the official Phorm selling blurb they touting it with so called “benefits” - see the BT Webwise site for an example - I think their pitch is very misleading…
“BT Webwise helps to increase your protection against online fraud and make your Internet browsing more relevant.”
Complete bunkum - search engines, web browsers, and your PC security software is already doing this. there’s no need to do it again.
“BT Webwise automatically increases your protection against online fraud by checking against a list of known fraudulent and untrustworthy websites. When you visit any website on the list, you’ll receive a warning, so you can choose whether or not to visit it. It’s another way BT is helping to protect you online.”
Yes but only on their list. Again search engines, browsers and PC security software already do this and much more thoroughly.
“BT Webwise also personalises the online advertising you see on participating websites by linking it to your interests. For example, if you search for a weekend trip to Paris or visit pages related to Paris, BT Webwise would help provide relevant advertising for travel or hotel information. You won’t see pop ups. You won’t see any more adverts than you normally do — they’ll just be more relevant!”
Yes you will see more “relevant” ads but remember they’ve already looked at your surfing habits so they know which ones to show you. Popups have nothing to do with it, your browser or PC security software is the thing that blocks popups, not Phorm!
“BT Webwise is completely free — and you don’t have to download or install any software for it to work.”
That’s nice of them, they’re not going to charge you to shove adverts in your face!
What’s in it for the ISP’s?
Money, lots of it. It’s estimated that BT alone could pocket £85,000,000 a year with this system, and all using your personal surfing information. You won’t see a penny from it.
Can I opt out of it?
Apparently you can opt-out but that’s not the point, a system like this should be opt-in from the start, though some ISP’s want you to be opted in automatically because they stand to make lots of money with your information. There are also a lot of concern that Phorm is illegal under UK law because it contravenes the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 (Ripa), which protects users from unlawful interception of information.
If you do opt out, Phorm can still track your activities. When opted out your ISP still needs to know that you don’t want the targetted ads and it still has to place a cookie on your system so it knows you’ve said “no”. Mind you, you will still see ads on the sites you visit.
Your privacy is at risk - the gory bits
Phorm logs information about what you’re looking at but it goes far beyond serving adverts. Unless you are on a secure page Phorm has the ability to scan your email, name, address as well as all the sites you’ve been visiting. All this information could potentially be misued if it fell into the wrong hands - remember Phorms background as a manufacturer of spyware. Phorm do state that emails are not scanned but the point is that they have the ability to do it, and that’s worrying.
What can I do about it?
If you are using an ISP that is considering using Phorm you can switch - there’s a growing list of Phorm-free ISP’s at the BadPhorm Forums along with advice on how to move from BT, Virgin and TalkTalk
Further reading…
BBC News - Illegal ad system scrutinied
Lavasoft Research Blog on Phorm
Badphorm
Sign the Phorm E-petition at 10 Downing Street
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