Managing Advertising Privacy
With U.S. regulators and legislators continuing to look at targeted online advertising, the networks whose businesses rely on serving such ads find themselves in a potentially difficult position.
The networks need to be concerned that legislation or regulation will be put forth to restrict the collection or use of data to target advertising at online users. An important part of the appeal of online advertising is that it has been presented as more targeted than traditional media, such as a TV, print, and radio, and this has been a factor in the shift to online. If the use of browsing behavior and other attributes is curtailed, then online advertising may no longer be as attractive, with the result that advertising rates and overall growth may decline.
So far, the networks have responded cautiously. For example, both Google and Yahoo! have released tools to allow users to manage their advertising preferences. Google's Privacy Dashboard permits users to see what Google is tracking about them (note that you need a Google account in order to view this information). Yahoo! has released its Ad Interest Manager, which similarly provides information about the user, but which also permits users to modify what types of ads are served. In order for the Ad Interest Manager to retain your settings, you must have a Yahoo! account and accept a cookie from Yahoo! Both organizations, along with most of the other ad networks, also belong to the Network Advertising Initiative which has also released an add-on to Firefox, which essentially helps preserve the cookies from NAI member sites, so that consumers' preferences can be maintained.
Another potential danger for the ad networks is consumer awareness and action. If significant numbers of users were to restrict targeted advertising, then the networks' reach would be reduced, which in turn could slow the growth in advertising revenue. Fortunately, if history is a good guide, this scenario is unlikely; most consumers do not use such browser features as deleting cookies or "private browsing."
How all of this plays will play out over the next few years is unclear. Again, if history is a guide, then we are likely to wind up with notification requirements, rather than outright bans on behaviorally-targeted ads. In this scenario, sites using targeting methods would need to clearly inform users about what data is being collected and how it is being used. Since much advertising is delivered across networks of affiliated sites, all sites within a network would need to comply with a common set of policies.
There is evidence to show that younger online users care less about privacy than older ones. And even among the wider population, only a small minority actively use existing privacy tools. In the end, these reforms are likely to add yet another artifact adorning web sites, that like the ubiquitous privacy policy statements, few people ever bother to review.
Posted at 09:59AM Dec 15, 2009
by David King in Data |
