Month: July 2009

Data collecting “Cookies are like bar codes…the blood of the system”

That headline comes from a news report on the “Agency Demand Platforms: Art vs. Science in a Real-Time World” event held this week in New York.  The report was critical of the call to protect user privacy by requiring consumer control over cookies and other stealth data collection practices.  It appears many online marketers view consumers as walking targets with digital barcodes embedded on their person.   Just because data collection on individuals is the “blood” for ad revenues, doesn’t mean we shouldn’t protect consumer privacy.

Here’s an excerpt from the piece quoting an unnamed ad executive:

Cookies are integral to advertisers and ad networks generating maximum value for publishers and guessed earnings would go down by 50 percent. Cookies are the blood of the system. Cookies are like bar codes, without them you would have to do everything manually and that doesn’t scale.

It’s also worth looking at the video interview and comments that accompany the Adotas story.  We know the IAB and others (including the Ad Council!) are lobbying lawmakers to head off any online privacy and consumer safeguards.  Instead of wasting resources, responsible leaders from the ad and marketing industries should embrace new policies that protect the public.

Behavioral Marketers Collect “terabytes” of data on consumers via cookies and other techniques [Annals of Behavioral Targeting]

Take a quick look at the first two graphs from this week’s Behavioral Insider newsletter.  And keep in mind that the online marketing industry is currently working to prevent Congress from enacting safeguards that protect consumers, including their privacy:

The lack of technology that sorts and stores the mounds of data collected from cookies and ad tags could contribute to the slow adoption of behavioral targeting, according to some advertising insiders.

The culprit becomes the terabytes of data from hundreds of thousands of ad impressions collecting geographic location, content on page, time of day, interaction with ads, frequency in which ads serve up, and more.

source:  Behavioral Targeting Creates Filter And Purge Technology Gap.  Laurie Sullivan.  Behavioral Insider.  July 16, 2009

Viacom/MTV Uses Neuromarketing to research ads in video games [Annals of Neuromarketing]

As we explained last month in our congressional testimony on behavioral targeting and advertising, the growing reliance on neuroscience-related techniques to design digital marketing messages is a serious policy issue.  Here’s an excerpt from a recent Viacom/MTV press release on a study it commissioned:

Using breakthrough biometric monitoring, a new study by MTV Networks has uncovered the most effective strategies for marketers to reach casual gamers.  The study, “Game Plan: Strategies for Marketing through Casual Games,” found that casual games command 99 percent focused attention from consumers.  By tracking respondents’ hand sweat, heart rate, respiration, movement patterns and visual attention during game play, the research yielded a clear road map for harnessing that engagement through targeted ad formats, lengths and integrations.

“Casual gaming continues to grow as a dominant online activity, and marketers have more opportunities than ever to connect with these highly engaged consumers from nearly every demo,” said Nada Stirratt, Executive Vice President of Digital Advertising, MTV Networks.  “This study provides a blueprint on how to leverage casual games for every marketing objective from driving awareness to increasing purchase intent to building a brand.”

The study was presented today to marketers and media buyers at MTV Networks headquarters in New York.   The research revealed a number of strategies for marketers looking to connect with casual gamers:

o     Get Ahead of the Action: Video placed before action games is among the most effective use of online video, commanding up to 85 percent focused attention.
o     Shorter is Better: A fifteen second pre-roll ad before a game commands 85 percent focused attention for the duration of the ad. Significantly, longer pre-rolls can be damaging, as aided recall for these drops by more than half.
o     Get in the Game: Brand integrations, or advergames, are best for games requiring higher levels of mental processing and focused attention. In games where brands achieved fifteen seconds or more of focused attention, aided recall approached 80 percent.
o     Anticipation = Opportunity: Consumer anticipation is a powerful opportunity — the load screen, menu pages and reward screens in games represent ideal placements for brand messaging, as gamers have the highest level of cognitive processing while waiting for their game to begin.

“Game Plan” tracked eye and biometric measures of respondents as they engaged in four online gaming experiences. These included a combination of branded and unbranded games, as well as video and display advertising around the games.  Biometric signals were integrated with data obtained from eye trackers, which measured players’ visual attention and pupillary response…

source: Breakthrough Biometric Research Uncovers the Most Effective Advertising Strategies for Connecting with Casual Gamers: New MTV Networks Study Reveals The “Game Plan” For Casual Gaming Advertising.  June 10, 2009

Progress & Freedom Foundation Comes to Aid of its Data-Collecting Backers (Using a `save the newspapers’ as a ploy to permit violations of consumer privacy protection!)

This report from Internetnews.com on the Progress and Freedom Foundation’s “Congressional” briefing illustrates how desperate some online marketers are that a growing number of bi-partisan congressional leaders want to protect consumer privacy.  So it’s not surprising that some groups that are actually financially supported by the biggest online marketing data collectors in the world would hold a Hill event to help out the friends who pay their bills.

It should have been noted in Ken Corbin’s that Google, Microsoft, Time Warner (AOL), News Corp. (MySpace) financially back the Progress and Freedom Foundation (PFF).  Other behavioral data targeting `want to be’s’ who monopolize U.S. online and other platforms are also backers:  AT&T, Comcast, NBC, Disney/ABC, Viacom/MTV/Nick, etc. For a list, see here.

PFF and some of its allies deliberately distort the critique of consumer and privacy groups.  We are not opposed to online marketing and also understand and support its revenue role for online publishing.  But many of us do oppose as unfair to consumers a stealth-like data collection, profiling and ubiquitous tracking system that targets people online.  One would suppose that as a sort of quasi-libertarian organization, PFF would support individual rights.  But given all the financial support PFF gets from the major online data collectors, how the group addresses the consumer privacy issue must be viewed under the `special interests pays the bills’ lens.

PFF and its allies are playing the ‘save the newspaper’ card in their desperate attempt to undermine the call for lawmakers to protect consumer privacy.  Newspapers and online publishers should be in the forefront of supporting reader/user privacy; it enhances, not conflicts, with the First Amendment in the digital era.  Finally, PFF’s positions on media issues over the years has actually contributed to the present crisis where journalism is on the endangered species list.  This is a group that has worked to dismantle the FCC, eliminate rules designed to foster diverse media ownership, and undermine network neutrality.

PS:  The article quotes from Prof. Howard Beales of George Washington University (and a fCV,ormer Bush FTC official with oversight on privacy).  Prof. Beales was on the PFF panel.  Prof. Beales, according to his CV has served as a consultant to AOL and others (including  Primerica and the Mortgage Insurance Companies of America).  Time Warner, which owns AOL, is a PFF financial backer.  All this should have been noted in the press coverage.

Consumers Union Tells Congress that FTC should do more work on “Online Behavioral Marketing… to protect consumer privacy”

Here’s an excerpt from today’s testimony by CU’s Gail Hillebrand before the House Commerce Committee’s consumer protection subcommittee.  The hearing was on the role of the FTC as a new (and much needed) Consumer Financial Products Protection Agency is potentially created.  The testimony was endorsed by other leading consumer groups, including Consumer Federation of America, Public Citizen and US PIRG.

Online Behavioral Marketing – More must be done to protect consumer privacy.
Consumers are being asked to pay a heavier and heavier price in order to take advantage of the full range of goods and services offered through the Internet, as marketers, researchers, data-mining companies and even service and content providers create profiles of personally identifiable information based on consumer behavior.  Internet service providers, content providers and vendors must take greater responsibility in considering the collateral impact their behavioral tracking models have on consumers.
The FTC should:
• investigate the online marketplace in light of new developments in the data mining field;
• expose marketing practices that compromise user privacy;
• issue the necessary injunctions to halt current practices that abuse consumers; and
• adopt policy principles outlining what can be considered technology neutral Fair Information Practices.

Google’s “Health Vertical” Division and the YouTube `Branded’ Channel for Obesity-related Medical Product

Google is in, as we know, the interactive marketing of health products and medical information.  Here’s an excerpt from Advertising Age on one of Google’s new YouTube related efforts.  We are deeply concerned about the role of interactive health marketing, including the techniques used to present information, influence consumer behavior, and collect user data.

Excerpt: In the video, Viki, a middle-age blonde, tears up recounting her moment of truth: A couple of years ago she was so obese that she could not chase after her toddler to keep him from running into the street…If this sounds like a setup for a weight-loss ad, that’s because it is. But not for a diet shake, pill or plan. The video is for Ethicon Endo-Surgery’s Realize adjustable gastric band — a device placed around the stomach that restricts food intake. The video is on Realize Band’s branded YouTube channel.

“Video is such a powerful medium for people who are having this type of surgery,” said Mary Ann Belliveau, managing director of Google Health Vertical. “What the channel does is give the patients a home for this, so they can get a more thorough experience, specifically with the company and the brand.”…The Realize band’s YouTube channel went live June 20 and already has received nearly 8,000 channel views. Ethicon also has a branded site for the band, where patients can learn more about the surgery and join the device’s online support program. In the video on YouTube, Viki describes her own experience with the Realize band. On the Realize website, consumers can read Viki’s diary, as well as those of other patients. Complementing Viki’s story on YouTube, there is a video simulating implantation of the band, and another explaining how to financially prepare for the surgery, which costs $17,000-$26,000 on average…”

source:  Gastric-Band Maker Reaches Out with YouTube Channel.  Marissa Miley.  Ad Age.  July 6, 2009 [sub required]

Online Consumers Require Real Privacy Safeguards, Not the Digital Fox [AAAA, ANA, BBB, DMA & IAB] in Charge of the Data Hen House

The self-regulatory proposals released today [2 July 2009]  by five marketing industry trade and lobby groups are way too little and far too late. This move by the online ad industry is an attempt, of course, to quell the growing bi-partisan calls in Congress to enact meaningful digital privacy and consumer protection laws. It’s also designed to assuage a reawakened Federal Trade Commission–whose new chair, Jon Leibowitz, recently appointed one the country’s most distinguished consumer advocates and legal scholars to direct its Bureau of Consumer Protection (David Vladeck). The principles are inadequate, even beyond their self-regulatory approach that condones, in effect, the “corporate fox guarding the digital data henhouse.” Effective government regulation is required to protect consumers. We should have learned a painful lesson by now with the failure of the financial industry to oversee itself. The reckless activities of the financial sector—made possible by a deregulatory, hands-off government policy–directly led to the current financial catastrophe. As more of our transactions and daily activities are conducted online, including those involving financial and health issues–through PCs, mobile phones, social networks, and the like–it is critical that the first principle be to ensure the basic protection of consumer privacy. Self-dealing “principles” concocted by online marketers simply won’t provide the level of protection consumers really require.

The industry appears to have embraced a definition of behavioral targeting and profiling that is at odds with how the practice actually works. Before any data is collected from consumers, they need to be candidly informed about the process–such as the creation and evolution of their profile; how tracking and data gathering occurs site to site; what data can be added to their profile from outside databases; the role that data targeting plays on so-called first-party websites, etc. In addition, the highest possible consumer safeguards are necessary when financial and health data are involved. Under the loosey-goosey trade industry principles, however, only “certain health and financial data” are to be treated as a “sensitive” category. This would permit widespread data collection involving personal information regarding our health and financial concerns. The new principles, moreover, fail to protect the privacy of teenagers; nor do they seriously address children’s privacy. (I was one of the two people that led the campaign to enact the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act).

The failure to develop adequate safeguards for sensitive consumer information illustrates, I believe, the inability of the ad marketing groups to seriously address online privacy. The so-called “notice and choice” approach embraced by the industry has failed. More links to better-written privacy statements don’t address the central problem: the collection of more and more user data for profiling and targeting purposes. There needs to be quick Congressional action placing limits on the collection, use and retention of consumer data; opt-in control over profile information; and the creation of a meaningful sensitive data category. Consumer and privacy groups intend to work with Congress to ensure that individuals don’t face additional losses due to unfair online marketing practices.

[press statement by the Center for Digital Democracy]