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FCC Meets To Investigate Cookie Abuse
PreacherTom writes to tell us BusinessWeek is reporting that the FCC and the Center for Digital Democracy plan to meet in order to discuss abuses with regard to cookies. From the article: "Online advertisers have a sweet tooth for cookies. Not the kind you bake, but the digital kind — those tiny files that embed themselves on a PC and keep tabs on what Web sites are visited on which machines. But cookies could have a bad aftertaste for consumers. Privacy advocates say the files are being force fed in large quantities to computer users, and they're demanding that the government put some advertisers on a diet."
I'm sorry, I'm sorry! But when you leave a box of those girl scout confections next to me, what do you think I'm going to do? They're gone after a few lines of coding and I don't even remember eating them!
*breaks down sobbing
I'm a sick man! I need help! Someone just check me into the Betty Crocker clinic already!
Suggested tag: thinkofthecookies
Thousands of children arrested for crumbling cookies and drowning them in milk.
An Indian-American Hindu committed to non-violent thought/speech/action alarmed by the global explosion of radical Islam
Cookie Monster replied, "Me not guilty. Cookie goooooooooooood!"
Remember, kids, cookies are a sometimes food.
Is this really an area we need more laws about? The dangers of cookies have been overblown for a long time. Not to mention that fact that all browsers give the user more than adequate control over their cookies.
If this is the best thing the FCC can find to waste their time on, then they have become worthless.
Spencer Ogden
Try browsing with cookies on an "ask me every time" sort of basis. Even the most unlikely websites will demand a cookie. What ever happened to sane usage of cookies where they'd only be set if you did something on the site that initiated a cookie transfer (e.g. logging in, starting a shopping cart, storing your preferences)?
'Yes, firefox is indeed greater than women. Can women block pops up for you? No. Can Firefox show you naked women? Yes.'
Just disable cookies in the browser by default. Or make them session cookies, that's a good enough second best.
What's the government supposed to do next, make it illegal for anyone to download a virus?
Honestly, some people won't be satisfied until the government publishes a 500 page manual on how to wipe your ass and makes it illegal to do it in any other way.
Infuriate left and right
Laws don't always correct things. This isn't something you can legislate. The sheer number of exceptions would make this law more complicated than anyone could follow or enforce.
Don't like cookies? Don't visit the sites that use them.
Is there any thing we can do about cookie pun abuse?
Thanks, Business Week. I've never heard any of those before. Perhaps you can stick in a few "roadkill on the information superhighway" gags while you're at it.
This guy
Of all the major problems with the Internet - too many cookies?!?!?!
UCE, Improving SMTP, Virii, Worms, Trojans, Zombies, These are real problems.
M.D.: "Your leg is necrotic, we need to rush you to get a pedicure".
Right after the horrible danger of cookies comes the fact that your internet address is being BROADCAST TO THE WORLD! This abuse is widespread and insidious. Only with government help can we address this problem to make our series of tubes safe for all idiots.
So this, like many other toppics like this, raises the question:
The FCC only has so much juresdiction. Would this apply to webpages that are hosted in the US? How about webpages that are being viewed in the US? Or what if they are hosted and vewed outside the US, but go through some wire in the US (or even worse, some satelite above the US...)
Of course, you could always regulate businesses and the way they do business in the US, but that shouldn't really be the FCCs responsibility. Not to mention that a business on the Net isn't just in the "US", especially if it sells ideas, information, or services, which are non-physical things that don't always cross borders and such.
It'll be interesting how this will play out in the next couple of years.
who | grep -i blond | date cd ~; unzip; touch; strip; finger; mount; gasp; yes; uptime; umount; sleep
When will our government learn that you can't legislate intelligence.
Hell, our population already proved we can't elect it, now mod me up for taking a crack at the President.
Now with more sodium!!
I set my browser to "Ask me everytime" On rare occasions, I need to allow cookies that I'd previously blocked. Problem is that my block list is hundreds deep and the names aren't always obvious. How do I find the one cookie permission I need to reset, short of erasing all permissions and starting over again? Along those lines, when I do allow cookies to keep me logged into a website, for example, how do I tell which cookies from that website are needed to keep me logged in and which ones are unnecessary (trial-and-error often creates the previous problem)?
When all of your wishes have been granted, many of your dreams will be destroyed - Marilyn Manson
I, for one, welcome our new cookie overlords!
All hail Cookie Monster!
If "disco" means "I learn" in Latin, does "discothèque" mean "I learn technology"?
The internet is beyond the congressionally approved reach of the FCC as it was created. Not to mention that people can (and do) selectively block and delete cookies. I know a number of average joes who know what cookies are and periodically go clear them out.
One accepts a cookie. It is not forced.
I thought the FCC spent all its time breakign the 1st amendment. Guess they're getting enough money from unconstitutional fines that they can hire more people.
"Have you ever thought about just turning off the TV, sitting down with your kids, and hitting them?"
Any Place to download a Vorbcast of this?
With Cookie Culler, you can choose the specific cookies to always keep and delete the rest every time you close your browser.
this is extra funny cuz I just ate 3 cookies for breakfast. But I don't have a problem dammit! ;) but seriously, who cares if they track where I go when I don't look at their banner ads anyway. Targetted ads are slightly less annoying than the random ones (click here to win your free xbox 360!), just look at google's intelligent ads.
Google's Super Secret Search Algorithm: SELECT @search_results FROM internet WHERE @search_results = 'good'
It's up to users to fight back. I have configured Firefox to ask me about cookies every time one is offered. If I see the dreaded __utma or RMID, I will block all cookies from that site. Others I will accept for the session only. I don't mind the odd PHPSESSID (even had one of them from a site pretending to be .asp once -- wonder if that was done for legacy compatibility reasons [keep the old filename even after upgrading to a better server platform] or by some smart IT bods getting paid to develop a site for a Microsoft server, then hosting it on a proper one and pocketing the money?)
If you're smart, you won't be tracked by cookies. But I've seen scary stackloads of cookies on machines running Microsoft crap. Come to think of it, even Firefox accepts all cookies by default.
Making browsers default to a safer cookie setting (disabled, or session-only) would be a step in the right direction, and so would simply outlawing data-mining (not that I expect anyone would take any notice of such a ban); but ultimately, it's still no substitute for users having some smarts.
Je fume. Tu fumes. Nous fûmes!
Enough with the eating puns!
FTA: "...sweet tooth for cookies...a bad aftertaste...force fed in large quantities...on a diet." I think I'm going to be sick.
NY started clamping down on trans fats in restaurants, it was just a matter of time 'til someone went after Oreo.
"If you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear." - Every fascist, ever
Goverments *coughUKcough* just love keeping information far more sensitive then this about their citizens. Are they just upset about someone else cutting in on their game?
I can't stomach any more food related word plays.
D'oh!
Skiffy is Spiffy, but Ort is tort.
If you use the Flash Plugin make sure you set the
local storage settings to 0 KB.
(Right click a flash banner and select "Settings..")
You can set cookies in Flash and it doesn't get deactivated
when you turn off cookies in your browser.
Advertisers haven't really started fully utilizing Flash's
ability to store data in a local sandbox, but don't worry they will.
And it goes completely underneath the browser cookie control radar!
There is so much flash content these days (banners, video) it is
bound to be exploited sooner than later.
AAFC (Anonymous Aware Flash Coder)
Either they're sticking their noses in things they have no business to nose in, or they're trying to come up with some unenforcable regulations. Could anyone tell me how this should be enforced?
Cookies are used for a lot of things. Keeping track of shopcarts, tracking client movement across pages so pages can be made more user friendly or guide you back where you come from, etc. Which of the thousands of applications of cookies are going to be deemed "good"?
Now, let's assume they come up with something. What does it change? Nada. A webpage that used cookies sensibly and responsibly will be "allowed" to continue doing this. Pages that offer shady deals and have dodgy ideas of the uses of cookies are most likely not in the US and thus way out of reach of the FCC.
So what is this stunt about? A statement along the lines of "Hey, look, we're still there and we do something but complaining about boobs!"?
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Cookies should only be able to store data you give a company. A cookie is not going through your computer and associate your cookie with your name, email address, credit card number, sexual proclivity, and so on.
Now you can say that prevalent advertisers like doubleclick can make inferences based on what sites you go to that they serve ads for. This is one reason that I block anything to/from doubleclick. The fact that this also has the advantage of eliminating several ads as I browse the web? Outstanding. I fail to see how this should suddenly become illegal for doubleclick to do.
So then you can argue "Yeah, but if you sign up with the website, or make a purchase, they can associate a cookie with all the information they gave you!" Yes, and so can any brick-and-morter who wants to track purchases made with the same credit card. Or grocery stores that give you "Discount Cards" that require a name, address, and phone number. Use that discount card once with a credit card and they have even more information on you.
So I fail to see how data acquired through cookies is so bad we need laws "protecting" us. Any privacy nut is going to be willing to either block cookies from certain sites or just make them session-long. Anyone else is running with about the same loss of privacy that comes with using a credit card anyway.
If you do not want online companies to know who you are (and therefore track you), then do not give out information.
- (c) 2018 Hank Zimmerman
It was as if thousands of Oreos cried out in terror, and were suddenly silenced...
</obligatory cliche>
/* No Comment */
The FCC shouldn't be wasting time on this. We have yet to find out who stole the cookie from the cookie jar. Who me? Couldn't be. Then who?
Similes are like metaphors
At what point is it too much to bear the oblique references (well, not that oblique) to cookies, diets, etc? I know kitchy metaphors are the stock in trade (there's another one) of the lazy newspaperman, but it's aggrivating that the online world bear so many more of them.
Information superhighway, chip on his shoulder, etc.
argh
disable all cookies and this extension makes it easy to enable or revoke permission or overide permanent/session cookies (turn a perm cookie into a session etc) for your fave sites (simple statusbar button, no complicated options)
basically it turns cookies into opt-in not opt-out
from Gorgias
http://mfe.gorgias.de/#pcookies
FF2 compatible
http://mfe.gorgias.de/xpi/pcookie_0_6_2.xpi
i have used it for ages and its really essential if you cant stand marketeers abuse
oh please help us mommy government! save us from the mean nasty cookies!
Seriously people. You can clear out cookies yourself, or block them, or whatever you want to do. I have a setup where cookies I want to keep are permanently saved (e.g., Slashdot), all others are cleared out at the end of session, so websites that need cookies to work still do fine, but I don't get any long-term tracking cookies. It's YOUR computer, you can do whatever you want with the data on it, Microsoft/Sony/etc.'s DRM aside.
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum sonatur.
Cookies are passive content; they do not have the capapbility of doing anything. Web Browsers are what make the decision to download and store this purely optional advisory-only information.
Again, you are describing a behavior of web browsers (and probably not all web browsers), not cookies.
I have always held that the software that I run, is my agent. If I run a web browser that essentially tells a web server what other pages I have visited, then by running that software, I have opted in. I guess the issue is that most computer users are not really aware of what they are running and what actions their agents are taking on their behalf, so they see the lack of making conscious decisions as "not opting out" rather than "opting in." I understand this and have some sympathy for this viewpoint, but it ultimately is technically incorrect, an illusion. I don't think you can't redefine the terms "opt out" and "opt in" to mean things they don't really mean, without having some undesirable consequences down the road.
The problem we face, is that we make unconscious or uninformed decisions, but that doesn't mean we aren't making those decisions; it merely means we're doing it poorly. I would much rather that users learn more about how their web browsers work and what the privacy risks are, than for new laws to be passed that micromanage what a web server admin is required to do, should their server be configured to send a certain header. It is ridiculous to have laws and regulations that get down to such detailed, technical levels, and I think that sort of thing is how we have managed to turn ourselves into a "lawyer society" where the law is so huge and complex that a layman is simply unable to know what the law is without expensive help from a specialist.
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
Cookie abuse? What cookie abuse? Oh, you mean loads of websites setting loads of cookies in your browser, which worked last century, before browsers allowed users to set policies for cookies.
Please correct me if I got my facts wrong.
They did it all for the cookie
yeah
The cookie
yeah
The cookie
OKOKOK.. I'll stop.
Seriously, Organizations need to realize that pulling the US government into anything to get something regulated is almost always analogous to using nuclear weapons and lawyers. You only use them when you know both sides will lose, but you want to make sure your enemy is screwed just as badly.
I'm a fiscal conservative, it's a pity we don't have a political party anymore
it wants its emerging privacy risk back.
I've browsed the internet with my ever changing browser of choice set to ask me about any and all cookies for years now. The number of cookies per site has been very steadily and rapidly increasing since their conception.
I hate it.
Back when they first appeared, they were there to help us maintain our logins through the website, not lose our shipping carts etc. It wasn't bad, it made sense. I was willing to let websites store my username and password so that I didn't have to keep logging back in constantly.
Honestly, I don't even see why we have cookies anymore. There should be far better ways to maintain a persistant login by now. Ways which don't threaten our privacy, or provide a medium for the same bastards that invented pop-ups and pop-unders to destroy common decency.
The first time I visit any website I am bombarded by cookies. This isn't just one cookie, this is as many as seven from a single page. Why in the name of Linux Torvalds do these sites need seven cookies to function? Clicking the next page bombards me again, and will keep bombarding me until I get through all 255 or more ad3.adserve.cookies.net like services. Only then can I finally visit the website in peace, until next month when a new advertiser joins the loop.
So now my cookie accept/block list is the size of New York's phone book. Heaven forbid in that barrage of cookies there was actually an important one. With all the obscure names they're given it's impossible to tell until you can't maintain your login. Now I get to play the age old 'Find the needle in the haystack' game, new millenium version.
This is beyond sanity. I don't know if the FCC has the right or the ability to do something about this, but something should be done. I don't have any idea what. Boycotting pages with cookies means 99.9% of the internet is off limits.
Thunderclone: ONE MAN ENTERS! TWO MEN LEAVE! ONE MAN ENTERS! TWO MEN LEAVE!
Instead of laws on cookies, how about laws requiring basic education on how to run the computer and web browser? Or maybe simply strong-arming Microsoft into deleting cookies upon exit of the browser.
In the meantime, what could be simpler than using Firefox, telling it to accept all cookies and then setting the drop-down to "delete when I close Firefox"? Really. Works like a champ and I wish them luck in tracking me with my ever changing IP.
...TV's leading expert, who said in a recent interview "Me abuse cookies? No way! See? (Hey, you know where me can get some biscotti? C'mon, help a monster out. Just this once. Me can stop any time me wants.)"
"I forgot my mantra."
Sweet tooth...aftertaste...force fed...diet
I think I'm going into metaphor overload.
OMG teh want to sell me stuffz!!!
nooohohoho waahaaaahaahhhhhhhh
I think a better question is: does the FTC have jurisdiction? The article as I see it says "Federal Trade Commission".
Firefox + CookieSafe. Problem solved. And no need to wake up all the politicians in congress to do it
95% of all computer errors occur between chair and keyboard (TM)
If you don't want cookies, simply shut them off in your browser or get off the internet, or don't visit the sites that are setting cookies you don't like.
The FCC doesn't need to be involved. Its this simple- your web browser is like callerid. By default, data can be left in the browser to identify you, just like your phone number will appear on someone's caller id by default. If you don't want people to know whose calling, you can disable cookies, or not call them. There isn't a significant problem here to waste the FCC's money and time on. How about them focusing on real issues like ISP's blocking certain ports or trying to prevent the use of certain protocols on their network....those are real problems.
What jurisdiction does the FCC have over the internet?
If users are not tech savvy enough to use Firefox & Permit Cookies, then they get exactly as much protection as they deserve. Cookies aren't the problem, stupid users are.
Here's where I go slightly off topic. Stop reading if you want.
I accept that advertisers are scum and will do whatever they can to make money off of me, so I fight back. I use Firefox, Permit Cookies, Flashblock, Adblock Plus, and Filterset.G Updater.
I no longer have cable (tv) - the only things I watch are things I downloaded and then put on my XBox with XBMC. I'm happy to say that commercials are no longer a part of my life! After shutting off cable for a while I can't stand to watch the TV in the break room or a friend's house because there are so many commercials. You don't realize just how many there are until you stop seeing them for a while. Try it! I do not subscribe to any advertisement packets calling themselves magazines. I use Gmail almost exclusively for personal mail and it's spam filters are pretty good.
I recommend trying all of the above.
Question everything
I resorted to whitelisting long ago. My browser denies all cookies by default. It took a little while to train myself to add a new site to the exceptions list when my login mysteriously wouldn't work, and a little longer to train my wife, but it has proven to be a very minor headache compared to a giant exceptions list, or a gianter cookie folder.
I am literally 3000 tokens away from the chaotic crossbow --Stephen
Set FireFox to deny all cookies.
Uncloak when you need to, allow the necessary cookies, deny sec.liveperson.net etc. Once you have completed your work on said website, delete ALL the denied websites. Set FireFox back to deny all. You will still be able to use the website (occasionally you may have to re-allow cookies to access new features). This way, you only have to manage the allowed websites and not the denied websites.
Also, use no-script to prevent getting some of the cookie requests in the first place. googlesyndication does not track me!
The issue that the parent brought up is that the FireFox GUI does not put the current site at top of list when you are trying to whitelist a site after say finding out that they really need it.
This is clearly a GUI usability issue. May be an option to sort by descending order when the site was blacklisted would help...
>all browsers give the user more than adequate control over their cookies.
Firefox 1.0x had this exactly right. In the cookie inspection dialog box, where you need to delete a large number of cookies while preserving a few important ones, they allowed multiple selection (control-click). Sometimes you'd want to add a permanent block on deleted cookies. Firefox even exposed their configuration setting of "and don't come back!" in a checkbox so that you could block cookies from a site at the same time you were looking at them.
Firefox 1.5 lost all this functionality.
Is there an extension to get me the same effects that (A) unlike some extensions, actually works, and (B) unlike some extensions, doesn't leak memory to the point of paralyzing my system?
this is why I ban double-click. As I gather, they once were a paper mail-order catalog type of company, peddling Sears and Penny's and Wards and such type stuff. Then, along came the computer and the Internets and then the cookies. Somewhere in this, a smarter portion of government told double-dick they couldn't amass the ELECTRONIC on-line ordering and compile and combine it with the paper catalog information they'd been amassing for decades.
Now, every damn where there's x10, doubleclick, icc.intelliserv, overture, uuva*d*vip, eqnj*advip*, akamai, nextag, mediaplex, and hundreds of others I have to keep updating my firewall AND browser to block. Yeh, it makes for hop-scotchy surfing, but if I can screw with the cookie monster, then it's worth it. I'd LIKE to be able to edit the cookies to falsify information (to make it gibberish, not to down their computers, mind you), but I guess, that would be like breaking the law and the government would like to make an example of me after some slimy-ass SIG gets the ball rolling.
But, as I see it, cookies are like trespass, mostly. Even when we block them, there are technologies that effectively can bypass or augment the cookies problem and we STILL have to figure out how to stay ahead of them. I wouldn't be surprised if cookies are the distraction and some other technology is already in use, say, data-grabbing Java-script apps. They are like corporate or stealth collector RPVs flying into my computer for no express purpose other than to sniff, catalog, reduce and resell me as information, most of the time useless, and most of the time not paying or benefitting me directly. Yeh, spare me the marketing spiel. Free web pages, free e-mail...
Previously: "Linux... Toward the Sunrise..." Now: "Linux... Toward the-- No, now, part of Every Sunrise"
I abused the shit out of some chocolate chip muthas after lunch today.
Terrible karma and aiming lower, which in this environment of one-sided reason, is higher.
Is there a method to do this in Opera?
You can set it to delete recent cookies .
I have a static cookie file that overwrites the Opera cookie file each time
Opera starts, however a more sophisticated method might be interesting.
I would like to do that, too, accept the cookie but send it back poisoned somehow, even just a hearty F and U!!! to the goofballs. Unfortunately, I have no idea how to do this, but would certainly start doing it if there was an easy program to use that did it.
The Federal Trade Commission is not the Federal Communications Commission. This thread certainly proves that /.ers never RTFA.
Anyone else browsing in "ask to set cookie mode"?
... 'black!'
:-D
If you are then you noticed that bizweek tried to set 5 cookies
I *DO* use opera in ask for cookies. I then accept domain wide cookies for my bank, credit card companies, mail servers, etc...
PLEASE, oh PLEASE do cut down on cookies. If I want to check out your latest reciepe for "Duck A L'Orange", I HARDLY need you to send me a cookie.
Note: the Duck a L'Orange and Cookie reciepe pun was just now noticed and not intentional
"Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way." -- Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy