PCWorld: Watch Out for Online Ads That Watch You

[tuvor]

You can keep at least some behavioral-ad cookies at bay by opting out of the services at the Network Advertising Initiative's site.Online ads are not only booming--and scrolling, spinning, shaking, shouting, and singing--they are also watching you even as you are viewing them, capturing your click patterns to create more detailed profiles than traditional browser cookies do.

Behavioral marketing networks such as BlueLithium, Revenue Science, and Tacoda display ads based on your browsing habits. Spending on these behavioral ads will grow from $1.5 billion in 2007 to more than $2 billion next year, according to eMarketer, a market research firm. And the company expects video ads to account for more than a third of that total.

The networks say that behavioral ads are more effective for advertisers, and usually less intrusive for consumers, than are standard pop-ups or adware. But the potential for abuse is troubling, privacy advocates claim, and the vast majority of Netizens have no idea that their actions are being tracked so closely.

Visit any of the 1000-plus sites on BlueLithium's ad network, and your PC will get a cookie that records the Web pages you visit, the ads you click, and whether you bought anything. The network then delivers ads based on your interests: Shop for cell phones at one site, and you might see ads for handsets at another, unrelated site, while someone with other interests would see a different ad. Unless you keep a close watch on your browser cookies, though, you'd never know you were being targeted. BlueLithium chief marketing officer Dakota Sullivan declines to name any of the company's clients, but says that they include 70 of the 100 most popular sites.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/pcworld/128272;_ylt=AnlqGNc63ejwPXAWS13C13gDW7oF;_ylu=X3oDMTBhcmljNmVhBHNlYwNtcm5ld3M-

[illinoisprogressive]

1. thanks. I never look at them. If one gets by my walls I click out right away.

[Verde]

2. Deleteth thy cookies!

In Firefox, open up your tools menu, select options, select privacy, then select show cookies and delete all.

You can then, in the previous menu and uncheck the accept cookies box and then select exceptions to include DU or other sites that you trust that require cookies to be used.

[tuvor]

3. Good to know. Thanks!

[AndyTiedye]

4. Let Them TRY to Make Sense of MY Browsing Habits

I wish them luck. My tastes are a bit outside the mainstream.

I'll even offer a few hints.

If they want to send me ads for psychedelic trance music, I'm OK with that.

Ads for nice lightweight recumbent bicycles would be OK too.

As one might deduce from my user name, silk or other natural fiber fabric and fabric dye is also of interest.
(though it'll be hard to beat Mendels' Feburary sale)

Ads for progressive organizations would be somewhat redundant. I think they all already found me :)

Some other hints: I already bought a new water heater. I will not be in the market for another one for at least 12 years.

The fact that I often visit website relating to the cars that I own does not mean that I intend to replace them soon.
Only new car that interests me at the moment is the Tesla. http://www.teslamotors.com/index.php?js_enabled=1