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Online Tracking Firms To Launch Opt-Out Program
storagedude writes "Threatened by the prospect of tougher US online privacy legislation, a handful of data collection companies have banded together to create a voluntary system for consumers to see what information companies have and to opt out of cookies or edit the data collected. The Better Advertising Project's Open Data Partnership is a long way from a viable solution — scores of tracking and big-name online companies have yet to sign on to the effort — but it is nonetheless the first attempt to put all this online tracking data in one place. Coupled with Microsoft's announcement this week that it plans to add a do-not-track mechanism to IE9, it appears that the FTC's call for a do-not-track system may be gaining some traction. The Open Data Partnership will be particularly interesting, as consumers will be getting a good look at the data collected about them. Better Advertising already lets consumers opt out of some behavioral ad targeting, and about 5% of those who click through to learn more actually opt out (PDF, slide 5). It will be interesting to see if the opt-out rate changes after consumers see what data is actually collected."
To be clear, they aren't saying they'll stop collecting the data. They'll just make it available to users and let people opt out of getting ads based on the information, or simply remove anything they don't want shared.
While the Open Data Partnership is a start, there are scores of online tracking and major internet companies that have yet to sign on to the effort.
That's where legislation comes in - you can't get 100% compliance without it. All you need is just one company to refuse to join and this opt-out program will fall apart.
Anyway, opt-out?!? Everything is becoming fucking opt-out. And if you don't know about something, how the fuck do you "opt-out:?
Fucking marketing people and their techie sell-out scumbags.
And those of us who do know about tracking have long since learned that any attempts to opt out actually result in more tracking/advertising/spam/whatever else you opt out.
Unless the perpetrators are actually trackable and reliably fined, there is no chance an opt-out system can work. The only case so far that _mostly_ (not completely) works is the Do-Not-Call phone list in the US. Here in Europe we have strict laws about protecting personal data, but unless a company loudly announces it has data of this kind these laws are unenforceable.
The creatures outside looked from Alt-Right to Antifa; but already it was impossible to say which was which.
No ad system will ever be acceptable to me unless it's "Opt In"!
Look, I'm internet savvy and resourceful. I can think for myself. If and when I want some product I will seek it out. None of your "throw your shit in my face" will make me want to buy your product. In fact it alienates me - IOW it has the opposite effect. Get this through your thick skull - people like me who actively use things like AdBlock are not your customers and never will be. We will seek out and buy things using the wonderful internet as a research tool if and when we - not you - determine we need your product. You'd be best to spend your ad dollars on making a stellar product!
Over the years I've had enough contact with the online marketing business to last me a lifetime. *puke*
It's partially rooted in their delusion that they actually think they're doing the average user a service by trying to sell him all kinds of crap (read: "the customer has needs and online advertisement facilitates the contact to vendors to satisfy this need"[/goodspeak]).
That's why they want the opt-in as default, to reach as many people as possible and guarantee them a larger revenue through possible sales.
It's hard to convince someone that what they're doing is wrong, when their job depends on it.
Actual laws against spam don't seem to have diminished the number of spam messages I get. I've actually taken the time to try and opt out of some the less annoying, slightly more legitimate emails and I've noticed something interesting that seems to be common to all of the opt-out pages I have seen.
A) If/when you sign up for something, you are implicitly agreeing to having your contact details and other information shared/sold to "business partners, service providers and other affiliates" but when you opt-out later, it applies only to the company directly. You'll still get spammed by those other firms.
B) They NEVER say that they will delete your data, just that they won't use it themselves. On it's own, your data is almost worthless, but in the aggregate with thousands of other people with similar profiles it can be worth quite a sum. So opting out still leaves the problem of companies unknown to me, collecting data about me against my will and then selling that data to god-knows-who anywhere in the world. (It's been alleged that intelligence agencies routinely obtain these data stores to cross reference against their existing files.) By the time you get around to opting out, your data could easily have been sold and re-sold dozens of times.
C)The fact that I am willing to actually read the Terms and chose to opt-out is itself another detail to add and cross reference with any other data that they have; or think they have, linked to me. A list composed purely of people who opt-out of (for example) the email alerts that they automatically got subscribed to when they joined a tech forum is probably pretty worthless for a fake Viagra spammer, but potentially worthwhile for a vendor of security and privacy protecting software. (oh the irony!)
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