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Advertisers Never Intended To Honor DNT

Posted by timothy on from the creative-interpretation dept.

First time accepted submitter oldlurker writes "After much discussion where many hoped a voluntary Do Not Track standard was agreed with advertisers, it turns out the advertisers already had a very different interpretation than most of us on how to practice it: 'Two big associations, the Interactive Advertising Bureau and the Digital Advertising Alliance, represent 90% of advertisers. Downey says those big groups have devised their own interpretation of Do Not Track. When the servers controlled by those big companies encounter a DNT=1 header, says Downey, "They have said they will stop serving targeted ads but will still collect and store and monetize data."'"

9 of 308 comments (clear)

  1. So in other words... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

    ...they will still track.

  2. This is where someone will say... by someone1234 · · Score: 5, Informative

    What ads? I use noscript and adblock.

    --
    Patents Drive Free Software as Hurricanes Drive Construction Industry
    1. Re:This is where someone will say... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

      Don't forget Ghostery.

      Indeed, don't forget to avoid it. it is a product of the advertising industry itself, specifically Evidon.

      Don't you think they love the metrics it provides about the types of ads and beacons that people are choosing to block?

      Let's see what Ghostery's maker says:

      That technology includes Ghostery, Evidon’s browser tool that reports on data collection across 26 million websites and informs the company’s business control solutions.

    2. Re:This is where someone will say... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

      You have to volunteer that data by activating their ghostrank option. There was a AMA on reddit where the devs have said that you can unpack the archive and examine the data yourselves if you don't trust them. Apparently all it sends back to them is what advertisers ghostery saw.

  3. Wasn't the point... by toxickitty · · Score: 5, Informative

    Wasn't the whole point of this to encourage advertisers to not track and if they do you have a leg to stand on in a court because you specifically made it clear you did not want to be tracked?

  4. Re:Missing the Point? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    Isn't that missing the entire point?

    Maybe, but not collecting and monetising the data is missing the point of trying to make money, and we can't have that now can we?!

    They don't seem too different to the music industry: they can't quite grasp that pissing people off may be a bad way to try making money out of them, and if you try to avoid their countermeasures you're obviously someone who wants something for nothing and a terrible person.

  5. Semantics by TemperedAlchemist · · Score: 4, Informative

    It's do not track not cover up track. I think these fellas need a course in remedial grammar.

    There are times I do want, say, Google to keep my data, and I don't care if they share it -- like if I search for Minecraft stuffs, I want MC stuff to appear on my search. Or if I search a topic and I'd rather be swayed towards more reliable sources that I would frequent rather than like, "HOMEOPATHY MAGIC QUANTUM JUICE PANACEA MAKE MONEY FROM HOME."

    For everthing else, there's Duck Duck Go

  6. Re:More elaborate schemes? by SScorpio · · Score: 3, Informative

    I don't feel that ABP is enough anymore. I started using Ghostery and it blocks a lot of things that ABP lets through.

    Yes ABP is great for blocking ads, but Ghostery will block the tracking cookies ABP doesn't care about. A plus for Ghostery is it remove all of the +1, Facebook, and Twitter links from around the web that I could care less about.

  7. Re:More elaborate schemes? by Emetophobe · · Score: 5, Informative

    Yes ABP is great for blocking ads, but Ghostery will block the tracking cookies ABP doesn't care about.. A plus for Ghostery is it remove all of the +1, Facebook, and Twitter links from around the web that I could care less about.

    ABP can do that aswell if you subscribe to the Anti-Social filter. Scroll to the very bottom of this page: http://adblockplus.org/en/subscriptions. It's under Miscellaneous.