Amazon Snooping Your Surfing For Targeted Ads?

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Amazon Snooping Your Surfing For Targeted Ads?

Posted by ryuzaki0 on Monday September 4, 2006 @06:56AM from the shoulder-surfing-retailers dept.

Jewfro_Macabbi writes, "Recently after browsing major online retailers for Bluetooth adapters, I went to Amazon.com to find front-page ads for, you guessed it, Bluetooth adapters. Disable cookies, the ads go away; re-enable cookies and the ads re-appear. The EULA is ambiguous as usual. Try it for yourself and see."

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not the same experience by yagu · 2006-09-04 06:57 · Score: 4, Insightful

I too tried to shop for bluetooth devices at a major online retailer... then I went to Amazon.com. Not a single reference anywhere to any bluetooth devices. For me the experiment ends there. I had cookies turned on (always do), and was logged into both sites with an account login.
Aren't "other" cookies supposed to be invisible to a domain application? I thought so. So, is there a possibility you are surfing at some retailer that has a partnership of some kind with amazon (many do), and hence the information is shared in a partnership, but not across the proscribed browser boundaries?
How long did it take you? by BWJones · 2006-09-04 06:58 · Score: 5, Interesting

How long did it take you to figure that out Jewfro_Macabbi?

To my end user (of Amazon.com) knowledge, they have been doing this for at least a couple of years. Of course, the problem with the EULA is that the cookie is set as soon as you visit unless you explicitly disable cookies.

Of course being anonymous is getting harder and harder these days (especially if you are surfing from a place that is having packets sniffed by someone like the NSA. (for kicks do a traceroute (*NIX and OS X, tracert on Windows) on NSA.gov from where you are and look for the AT&T hub that is splitting the traffic (The AT&T hub for my traffic is tbr1013801.dvmco.ip.att.net). I know my packets are sniffed coming from an edu domain as well.......

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1. Re:How long did it take you? by cuban321 · 2006-09-04 07:30 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  Yeah cause you know... AT&T couldn't just be their upstream provider or anything. /tinfoil
2. Re:How long did it take you? by Afecks · 2006-09-04 07:37 · Score: 3, Funny
  
  Wow, you mean when I go to www.nsa.gov my packets can be sniffed by AT&T and then given to the NSA? What kind of twisted Orwellian nightmare has this world become?!
3. Re:How long did it take you? by cuban321 · 2006-09-04 08:34 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  (Offtopic, but oh well I couldn't resist)
  
  You seem to have a lack of understanding about how the Internet works. I go through qwest to get to /.-- that doesn't mean qwest is "sniffing" my traffic. It simply means qwest is a provider who is peered with speakeasy (my ISP) and savvis (apparently Slashdots' provider).
  
  Do you really think the NSA wouldn't use transparent ethernet taps anyways? And do you really think the NSA would have all that traffic dumped back to "nsa.gov"?
How was this accepted? by Anonymous Coward · 2006-09-04 07:03 · Score: 2, Insightful

The only way amazon could know you were looking for an item would be if they themselves set the cookie. I think you'll find one of the retailers you visited was an amazon shop or the like. I don't use these 'one-click' pioneers myself but this is just bullshit!
Known issue by XanC · 2006-09-04 07:05 · Score: 5, Insightful

He's not claiming Amazon hacked his browser. It's been known for ages that if two sites both use the same ad company to display ads, that your activity on both sites can be linked. He's saying Amazon is using these data to target ads on their front page.
A9 or Alexa Toolbar by HTMLSpinnr · 2006-09-04 07:13 · Score: 4, Informative

I wonder if the original submitter happens to browse with the A9 or Alexa toolbars enabled? Both are subsidiaries of Amazon.com. One would need to review their EULA's though to see if said info can be used to target shopping ads from their own site.

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$ man woman *
-bash: /usr/bin/man: Argument list too long
1. Re:A9 or Alexa Toolbar by fermion · 2006-09-04 12:37 · Score: 2, Informative
  
  While toolbars are the logical explanation, it could be that this person normally runs with cookies wide open. This means that the web usages is being tracked by the affiliate cookies. Though cookies are set up to be read only by the site that set them, most sites get around this by having double click, 2o7, etc set root tracking cookies. Therefore the average person, lets say the majority of the majority that still run IE wide open, is well tracked. It would be trivial to expand this to coded shopping categories. For the average user it might be a valuable service, and others should learn to accept only root cookies.
  
  --
  "She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
2. Re:A9 or Alexa Toolbar by Jewfro_Macabbi · 2006-09-04 13:07 · Score: 2, Insightful
  
  I went and visited foreign based Islamic web sites for products, and Amazon recommended Islamic books and films after. I'm not seeing it as likely Amazon has partnerships with these companies....
3. Re:A9 or Alexa Toolbar by Technician · 2006-09-04 16:26 · Score: 2, Insightful
  
  While toolbars are the logical explanation, it could be that this person normally runs with cookies wide open.
  
  Running AdAware and having a good hosts file go a long way in keeping the advitisers from setting tracking cookies.
  
  --
  The truth shall set you free!
Amazon hosting? by Rosyna · 2006-09-04 07:18 · Score: 4, Interesting

It seems more like amazon is hosting these major retailer's websites. For example, if you go to target.com it says on the bottom right, "Powered by Amazon.com". Amazon has their hands in a lot of retailers pockets. Mostly because it is just easier to pay amazon to do it than it is to set it all up yourself. Especially when amazon.com is a "proven" website.
Buy It On.... by DynaSoar · 2006-09-04 07:18 · Score: 4, Funny

While searching a bit torrent site for old episodes of La Femme Nikita, I was regaled by an ad which read:
"Can't find La Femme? Buy it on eBay!"

Really. Just a rental as per usual, or an all out purchase?
Can I take it for a test drive?
The shipping would probably be horrendous. I'll bet they sell them "pick up only". Which is, after all, the usual way. So who needs eBay?

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"I may be synthetic, but I'm not stupid." -- Bishop 341-B
It's actually... by ericdano · 2006-09-04 07:20 · Score: 2, Funny

It's actually a Ninja named Roger who's pissed at him. He's waiting for the author to click on the wrong link.

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I was looking at this the other day... by Lord+Prox · 2006-09-04 07:25 · Score: 4, Informative

I am building a website on website traffic tips n tricks and stumbled upon this...
Retargeting
I am 90% sure that this is what they are doing or some variation thereof. Inexpensive service that should work well.

Place a curse in the RIAA/MPAA.
1. Re:I was looking at this the other day... by jrumney · 2006-09-04 07:50 · Score: 2, Insightful
  
  Inexpensive service that should work well.
  
  Step 4: The consumer returns to your site to complete the sale.
  
  Now you have the ability to send visitors directly to your "here is where we close the sale" page by doing some or all of the following:
  
  * Send them directly to the ordering page of the product they looked at before leaving.
  
  That should work well... if your intention is to make your potential customers think you are stalking them!
my test by gEvil+(beta) · 2006-09-04 07:27 · Score: 2, Interesting

After clearing my cache/cookies/etc, I closed and then reopened Firefox. I went to google and did a search for "bluetooth adapters." I middle clicked on everything on the results page except the amazon.com link. I then opened a new tab and went to amazon.com. They wanted to sell me LCD TVs, an electric toothbrush, some DVD box sets, iPod and cell phone cases, purses and messenger bags, and some watches. No bluetooth devices at all. Go figure...

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This guy's the limit!
1. Re:my test by gEvil+(beta) · 2006-09-04 07:47 · Score: 3, Informative
  
  I tried it again cos I like repeatability. This time I also clicked on all of the google "sponsored links." This time amazon wanted me to buy a Creative Zen, a smattering of sandals (guess it's time to clear out all those summer sandals), some Sony hifi stuff, pants and dresses, more shoes, and some more watches. Still no bluetooth stuff. However, if I click the amazon link from my bluetooth search and then open a new window and go to amazon.com via the address bar, the front page is chock full o' bluetooth adapters (with some sandals and watches at the bottom). Clearly Jewfro clicked on an amazon or target link earlier in his journeys in the tubes.
  
  --
  This guy's the limit!
Very misleading by bill0755 · 2006-09-04 08:17 · Score: 2, Interesting

Your claim definitely scores high for tapping into paranoia of cookies. Unfortunately, the only way Amazon knows you are looking for bluetooth adapters is if you visit their site first. This may have happened by way of a search result. Is this supposed to be surprising?
Nice try though. Cookie paranoia is a bit worn out for me.
This helps me by a_greer2005 · 2006-09-04 09:07 · Score: 2

I can clearly see the bad implecations here, but as a responsable user, this has helped me over the past few months: I look for an item on Target, walmart, froogle, whatever, then go to amazon and it is right there, no searching needed. This is not good privacy wise, but pretty conveniant for those of us who delete cookies at responsable intervals (read weekly or more).
Re:20-30 bucks. Impulse purchase range. by cduffy · 2006-09-04 13:24 · Score: 2, Insightful

Individual americans are going through tough economic times in large part due to a culture of irresponsible debt spending. Having a comparatively high ceiling for impulse purchases is part and parcel.

(Obviously, this doesn't apply to everyone).