Phorm, the latest and, allegedly greatest, ad tracking / management / filtering software to be pressed into the public eye has been getting a few column inches lately based mainly on the claim that it tracks where user go and which sites they visit.

Formerly 121media, the adware people, Phorm claims that it’s a :

“proprietary ad serving technology uses anonymised ISP data to deliver the right ad to the right person at the right time - the right number of times. Our platform gives consumers advertising that's tailored to their interests - in real time - with irrelevant ads replaced in the process.”,

It’s the "tracking users" thing that has people tied up in knots, but in a recent bbc interview with Phorm the most interesting point came from way that users can 'opt out'

The company states that, when you opt out of the service then the systems at the ISP "check for the presence of an opt-out cookie.".

which means that if you opt out and then delete your cookies, your opted back in by default, not good. If I opt out I expect to stay opted out. It also means that by default you have opted in, so users who may not be too familiar with web cookies, may not opt out because they do not understand the implications.  Always assuming that this opt out statement is clearly presented to all users.

Finally why "opt out" at all , I "opt in" to mail lists, I should be given the option to "opt in" to target ad systems, or is the company be worried that too few users would be happy about being tracked, and so decide not to "opt in" no matter what the assurances?

One to watch 

John Morse - Information Architect