Microsoft Using Personal Data to Target Ads

smooth wombat writes "Microsoft is combing personal data with your search habits to produce targeted ads. Users who use Microsoft's Hotmail email service, msn.com news service and other Microsoft-owned sites will see ads specific to their demographic and interests. From the article: 'Microsoft executives say the system works anonymously and they won't pass on people's names or addresses to advertisers. Executives say they want to foster confidence in users to build a long-term business, and one that gives an incentive to not misuse personal details.' "We're in the early days of behavioral targeting but it's an idea whose time has come,' says Simon Andrews, chief digital strategy officer for WPP Group's MindShare, a large buyer of ad time. 'There is a lot of potential to know if people have been looking at specific sites.'"

Comments

welcome to the world of marketing

[monkeyserver.com]

I'm sure people will get up in arms, but this is what everyone does. They take all the info they have about you and they try to find out how to use that to most effectively market to you. Google does it, and so do most retailers. Retailers look at demographic info they have, purchase and return behaviors, and they often buy "data appends", or data about you collected by third parties, to augment their info.

They don't use this to hunt you down, spy on you in the bathroom, or brainwash you. What they do is figure out, statistically, based on this info, what you will buy, and try to sell that to you. It's how they make money more effeciently, and when done right, it's a service to you too. This is on the rise too, the best thing to do here is to embrace it and encourage companies to behave responsibly with this new-found knowledge.

Re:If It Looks Like Spam...

[malfunct]

I don't know if its still there but somewhere in the privacy statements for MSN sites was a 1-800 number you could call to opt out of all ad targeting that was linked to your passport account.

Re:Hmmm

[Anonymous Coward]

No, my friend, that's a totally different can of worms.
Gmail presents you with ads based on the content of the page you are *currently* looking at. It does not rely on any personal information about you.
It sounds like what Microsoft is doing is identifying who are every time you use any of their web services and building up a persistent personal profile of what you are interested in. So next time your significant other asks you why she keeps getting porn ads on every site she visits when she uses your computer, you can point her to this article ;)

Big Deal

[KwKSilver]

I'm no fan of MS, but what else is new? If you don't like it don't use the product. MS's EULAs give MS the right to do whatever they want to with your data, and even if the EULA didn't it gives MS the right to change the EULA to say whatever they want it to say & you can agree or kiss your files goodbye. Isn't stuff like this the real reason why index.dat link files are around? To feed MS data to use? Again, if you don't like it, don't use the stuff. There are ways out.

Even more so ...

[kbahey]

Well, here is a real life case from a relative of mine:

Last October, he was searching Yahoo for a website of a conference that was held in Sao Paolo, Brazil. Less than an hour later he receives an email from Expedia, which he used before to book travel (and probably checked off or left checked, a box that says "send me spam").

The email from Expedia says:

"Dear X, Looking for a hotel in Sao Paulo? We make it easy, thanks to a variety of ways to search. Plus, with our Best Price Guarantee, you'll always get the lowest price. The best rooms and rates go fast--start your hotel search now."

So, does Yahoo sell the info in real time to rival Microsoft, rather than their own Yahoo Travel? Or what?

It can't be a coincidence for sure.