In a first, the Federal Trade Commission has charged an ad network with engaging in a deceptive business practice by allegedly using Flash cookies to track Web users.
The regulators' complaint, unveiled on Tuesday, alleges that video ad network ScanScout violated its privacy policy by using Flash cookies from 2007 to 2009 in order to track users' online activity to serve them targeted ads.
Flash cookies were originally designed to remember users' preferences for online video players and other applications, but some companies use such cookies to store the same type of information that is normally found on HTTP cookies. Flash cookies are stored in a different place in people's browsers than HTTP cookies and, until recently, couldn't be deleted or blocked through browser controls.
ScanScout, which was acquired last year by Tremor Media, allegedly said in its privacy policy that users could opt out of receiving cookies by changing their browser settings. That statement was deceptive, the FTC says in the complaint.
“ScanScout represented, expressly or by implication, that consumers could prevent ScanScout from collecting data about their online activities by changing their browser settings to prevent the receipt of cookies,” the FTC alleges. “Consumers could not prevent ScanScout from collecting data about their online activities by changing their browser settings to prevent the receipt of cookies. Therefore, the representation ... was false or misleading.”
The case comes almost two years after consumer protection head David Vladeck expressed concern that companies were thwarting users' privacy settings with Flash cookies. Since then, several other companies have been accused of tracking people with Flash cookies and three companies -- Quantcast, Clearspring and Say Media's VideoEgg -- agreed to pay a total of $3.4 million to settle civil lawsuits.
The FTC hasn't publicly accused any companies other than ScanScout of using Flash cookies deceptively.
The same day that the FTC announced the complaint, it also announced that Tremor had agreed to settle the charges by promising to notify Web users about tracking and allow them to opt out. The company specifically said it will allow users to opt out of the collection of most data containing unique identifiers, including an IP addresses. The proposed settlement allows Tremor to continue collecting data from opted-out users for some purposes, including frequency capping, fraud prevention and age verification.
Tremor said two months ago that it planned to roll out the you-are-being-targeted icons developed by the umbrella group Digital Advertising Alliance on video ads. The company isn't admitting wrongdoing as part of the proposed settlement.
Tremor also is facing a lawsuit in federal court in Boston by consumers over ScanScout's alleged use of Flash cookies. Defendants in that case include AOL and Brightcove. All recently filed court papers asking for the matter to be dismissed. ScanScout said in its court papers in that matter that it “never used Flash or any other technology to respawn deleted cookies.”
by Wendy Davis
Wednesday, November 9, 2011
Monday, October 31, 2011
Google Introduces New Encryption Process for Organic Search Queries: Results May Vary
Google announced that starting October 18, 2011 a new privacy protection process for organic search analytics. Organic search queries executed by those consumers logged into Google products will no longer be available to web analytics systems (including Google Analytics, Adobe SiteCatalyst, WebTrends, Coremetrics, etc.) or other Google products (Keyword Tool, Trends, etc.). Note: this does NOT impact paid search analytics, even if a searcher is logged in to a Google property. Google’s view is that advertisers pay for this information in order to optimize their programs. Google will continue to provide total search volume on the platform, and it will continue to serve query level data for those organic search queries executed on the system that are from consumers not-logged into its web products. The purpose of this note is to discuss why they are doing this, and what search marketers should expect and do.
Why is Google implementing this? The answer is simple. Privacy. Searchers logged into Google through any of its products (Gmail, Google+, YouTube) receive search results that are customized to their search history—they are personalized. Even though the data that is passed on to web analytics products is, in most cases, impossible to reconcile to an individual searcher – this is a proactive move by Google to reduce privacy concerns (both in the US as well as the EU) by saying “no search queries that have been personalized will be available to any third party.”
What is the impact of this on search marketers? Google reported that less than 10% of search queries that are executed are done by consumers logged into Google products. We have no reason to dispute this statistic, so we recommend that advertisers assume that 5 – 10% of search queries are from personalized results. So any keyword level organic analysis reporting that advertisers use from their web analytics systems will start to show 5 – 10% lower referral volumes starting immediately. We do believe that this percentage will continue to increase over time, so this statistic will require on-going adjustments as additional benchmark statistics on personalization use come available. On a technical level, the process by which Google reports referential data is still unclear. For example, in Organic Search Insight™, we get data that is unique to the data, search engine, entry URL and search query. Google is saying they will continue to provide all of this data except the search query. We are in the process of testing how this is formatted through analysis of weblogs for our own site and will report on results when they come available.
It is our understanding that this encryption process is being rolled out globally. To understand the impact, we recommend that our customers do a benchmark for their top 25 organic search queries by analyzing daily variations over a 2 – 3 week period within each geography, as personalization percentages will be different by country. The purpose should be to see if there is a substantial fall off in daily keyword level referential volume—on Google only—for a particular geography. If the results for the post effective data (October 18, 2011) query volume are lower, this should be determined using 25 days prior and post the change date and this can be used as the best proxy for how to adjust query level volumes upward.
This will impact the ability of systems to look at paid and organic synergy as these types of analytics require query level granularity to see how individual searches interact between the paid and organic listing. Search advertisers may get more traffic from organic search than is reported. They may erroneously conclude that they need to purchase additional PPC volume for particular keywords when in fact their shortfalls on organic are the results of this encryption process. No changes should be made to process until the benchmarking process above is completed – again, by geography.
by Jeff MacGurn
Why is Google implementing this? The answer is simple. Privacy. Searchers logged into Google through any of its products (Gmail, Google+, YouTube) receive search results that are customized to their search history—they are personalized. Even though the data that is passed on to web analytics products is, in most cases, impossible to reconcile to an individual searcher – this is a proactive move by Google to reduce privacy concerns (both in the US as well as the EU) by saying “no search queries that have been personalized will be available to any third party.”
What is the impact of this on search marketers? Google reported that less than 10% of search queries that are executed are done by consumers logged into Google products. We have no reason to dispute this statistic, so we recommend that advertisers assume that 5 – 10% of search queries are from personalized results. So any keyword level organic analysis reporting that advertisers use from their web analytics systems will start to show 5 – 10% lower referral volumes starting immediately. We do believe that this percentage will continue to increase over time, so this statistic will require on-going adjustments as additional benchmark statistics on personalization use come available. On a technical level, the process by which Google reports referential data is still unclear. For example, in Organic Search Insight™, we get data that is unique to the data, search engine, entry URL and search query. Google is saying they will continue to provide all of this data except the search query. We are in the process of testing how this is formatted through analysis of weblogs for our own site and will report on results when they come available.
It is our understanding that this encryption process is being rolled out globally. To understand the impact, we recommend that our customers do a benchmark for their top 25 organic search queries by analyzing daily variations over a 2 – 3 week period within each geography, as personalization percentages will be different by country. The purpose should be to see if there is a substantial fall off in daily keyword level referential volume—on Google only—for a particular geography. If the results for the post effective data (October 18, 2011) query volume are lower, this should be determined using 25 days prior and post the change date and this can be used as the best proxy for how to adjust query level volumes upward.
This will impact the ability of systems to look at paid and organic synergy as these types of analytics require query level granularity to see how individual searches interact between the paid and organic listing. Search advertisers may get more traffic from organic search than is reported. They may erroneously conclude that they need to purchase additional PPC volume for particular keywords when in fact their shortfalls on organic are the results of this encryption process. No changes should be made to process until the benchmarking process above is completed – again, by geography.
by Jeff MacGurn
Friday, July 8, 2011
How The White House Blogged Nothing About The New Piracy Agreement
The White House decided a new voluntary agreement between ISPs and Hollywood on internet privacy was important enough to blog about. Unfortunately, the blog post pretty much said nothing. Since I already wasted time reading that White House post, I decided I should waste more time deconstructing what a waste of time it was.
The Administration is committed to reducing infringement of American intellectual property as part of our ongoing commitment to support jobs, increase exports and maintain our global competitiveness.
Well, I assume you’re committed to reducing anything that’s against the law, right? I mean, that’s why we have laws. But if you want to give me the this is all about jobs spiel, I suppose an election year is coming up.
The joining of Internet service providers and entertainment companies…
I’m sorry. Was there a merger of some sort? Is the FTC involved? Don’t some of the entertainment companies already own ISPs? But go on, I’m sure you’ll explain more.
…in a cooperative effort to combat online infringement can further this goal and we commend them for reaching this agreement. We believe it will have a significant impact on reducing online piracy.
Say what? What effort? What are they doing? Got a link or anything about this? Sounds pretty important. If I wanted to understand more about it, um, you want to point me to anything in particular?
We believe that this agreement is a positive step and consistent with our strategy of encouraging voluntary efforts to strengthen online intellectual property enforcement and with our broader Internet policy principles, emphasizing privacy, free speech, competition and due process.
Again, what agreement? You’re telling me this is all wonderful, but you can’t explain what’s going on? I mean, I know it’s all voluntary or whatever, and you’ve got nothing apparently to do with it other than saying you support it. But if you are so supportive of it to do a blog post, maybe you could explain it?
As such, we will follow the implementation and outcomes of this arrangement with great interest. Our expectation is that the new organization created by it will have ongoing consultations with privacy and freedom of expression advocacy groups to assure that its practices are fully consistent with the democratic values that have helped the Internet to flourish.
There’s a new organization? What’s it called? Does it have a web site? A Twitter account? Throw me a bone here. Maybe tell me some of the organizations behind it?
Simultaneously, the Administration will continue to pursue comprehensive solutions to the problems associated with Internet piracy, including increased law enforcement and educational awareness. To win the future and succeed in the global economy, it is critical to protect the intellectual property of America’s innovators and creators.
Really, that’s it? You called me over to the blog to tell me basically nothing? Thanks. I ended up having to head over to Techmeme, to read what journalists were writing about this new rosy future. Thank goodness they were around, because you told me zilch.
Next time, if you have nothing to say, then say nothing.
Oh, special request. If you’re all for helping Hollywood fight piracy, how about helping those consumers who actually do buy thing legitimately. For one, I never, ever, ever want a DVD to force me to sit through 5 minutes of previews. Can we have a law that if I push Menu, I immediately get the Menu button?
And that FBI warning? Enough. Let them put it on the box. I don’t need to see that logo over and over again. What other industry gets to shove those kind of warnings down the throats of consumers over and over again, outside of maybe the airline industry. And it’s not like we’re getting safety instructions, or anything.
By Danny Sullivan
The Administration is committed to reducing infringement of American intellectual property as part of our ongoing commitment to support jobs, increase exports and maintain our global competitiveness.
Well, I assume you’re committed to reducing anything that’s against the law, right? I mean, that’s why we have laws. But if you want to give me the this is all about jobs spiel, I suppose an election year is coming up.
The joining of Internet service providers and entertainment companies…
I’m sorry. Was there a merger of some sort? Is the FTC involved? Don’t some of the entertainment companies already own ISPs? But go on, I’m sure you’ll explain more.
…in a cooperative effort to combat online infringement can further this goal and we commend them for reaching this agreement. We believe it will have a significant impact on reducing online piracy.
Say what? What effort? What are they doing? Got a link or anything about this? Sounds pretty important. If I wanted to understand more about it, um, you want to point me to anything in particular?
We believe that this agreement is a positive step and consistent with our strategy of encouraging voluntary efforts to strengthen online intellectual property enforcement and with our broader Internet policy principles, emphasizing privacy, free speech, competition and due process.
Again, what agreement? You’re telling me this is all wonderful, but you can’t explain what’s going on? I mean, I know it’s all voluntary or whatever, and you’ve got nothing apparently to do with it other than saying you support it. But if you are so supportive of it to do a blog post, maybe you could explain it?
As such, we will follow the implementation and outcomes of this arrangement with great interest. Our expectation is that the new organization created by it will have ongoing consultations with privacy and freedom of expression advocacy groups to assure that its practices are fully consistent with the democratic values that have helped the Internet to flourish.
There’s a new organization? What’s it called? Does it have a web site? A Twitter account? Throw me a bone here. Maybe tell me some of the organizations behind it?
Simultaneously, the Administration will continue to pursue comprehensive solutions to the problems associated with Internet piracy, including increased law enforcement and educational awareness. To win the future and succeed in the global economy, it is critical to protect the intellectual property of America’s innovators and creators.
Really, that’s it? You called me over to the blog to tell me basically nothing? Thanks. I ended up having to head over to Techmeme, to read what journalists were writing about this new rosy future. Thank goodness they were around, because you told me zilch.
Next time, if you have nothing to say, then say nothing.
Oh, special request. If you’re all for helping Hollywood fight piracy, how about helping those consumers who actually do buy thing legitimately. For one, I never, ever, ever want a DVD to force me to sit through 5 minutes of previews. Can we have a law that if I push Menu, I immediately get the Menu button?
And that FBI warning? Enough. Let them put it on the box. I don’t need to see that logo over and over again. What other industry gets to shove those kind of warnings down the throats of consumers over and over again, outside of maybe the airline industry. And it’s not like we’re getting safety instructions, or anything.
By Danny Sullivan
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