Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

ohh im sure we can beef that up no end, on first read it strikes me that the sender is saying something about adverts....., ill pass it along.

i think we need something far stronger, not worked out the outline yet but something like

dear [insert name]

i write to you today on a most urgent and long reaching privacy matter. effecting a mass of consumers and business both in the uk and the whole EU, perhaps even the world.

it is proposed that the UK/EU broadband ISPs covertly sell (some might say comercially pirate)their users personal data property....

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Please do beef it up all you want. I did admit it wasnt very good. Personally think the last thing we should do is send them a 5 page letter detailing in depth legal arguments about sections and subsections of various laws. My idea was to keep things simple and give them links to articles that would go into all the detailed stuff. Others may disagree though.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

thats alright, we have to start somewere, my typing isnt up to a one draft clear post but there are many readers here that can improve it and yet keep it generic enough for posting to most orgs etc.

no rush, lets get the points down clear then re-org it for impact and clarity.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Sounds good to me.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

While searching for some EU data commissioner info I found this site, and I'm going to drop them an email. Although the FIPR are members I don't think it would hurt to have them on our side

Digital Rights Europe http://www.edri.org/

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

For others who may want to write via http://www.writetothem.com/ be aware they attempt to filter out "identikit" (their term) letters. ( http://www.writetothem.com/about-qa#formletters ) So if using a generic template do rearrange the wording a little and include some of your own.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

(my bold)

Again, Phorm lie. It is possible with their system, but they have told us they won't do this. (won't, not can't). All we need to do is trust them on this. Trust? A company whose PR team are compulsive liers?

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

PhormPRTeam Watch:

They were at it again here: http://www.broadbandgenie.co.uk/broa...academics-say/

I have just posted a comment in reply and its waiting for moderation right now.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

You had me worried, but it's dated yesterday. I felt certain there would be a fundamental cosmic force preventing them from working on Good Friday.;)

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Just had a reply to the email side of my DPA notice.

Its the standard ******** reply.Next i will reply to that asking what they intend to do about the requests i made in my letter and email, Should that have a standard reply then i forward both to the Data protection registrar with a non compliance letter.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

That made me laugh out loud.

Slightly OT
 

I've just had a look at the European Digital Rights site, and I found an article that has me a bit worried, as it sets a precedent:

http://www.edri.org/edrigram/number5...nch-isp-piracy

- surely it contravenes EU privacy laws...and if it doesn't, why not? How long before our lot start doing that? In fact, they pretty much have, haven't they?

I submit that all the online piracy in the world will not do as much harm in the long run as what our governments are doing to their own citizens. Trust is as easy to shatter as it is hard to earn. Unless they change their ways, the only two futures open to us that I can see are widespread spontaneous rebellion (it'd have to be spontaneous because if it were planned, they'd know about it...) or an Orwellian state. We could really use Hari Seldon and psychohistory about now...

The thought occurs: aren't government officials worried about their privacy? Aren't banks and online stores worried about what this might mean to their business?

As always, I note I do not intend to disappear from public view any time in the near future - well, only for a few days (if the Phorm deal goes ahead) while I sort out a new ISP. :rolleyes:

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

thats french ISP piracy directive based on ,i assume the same Belgian courts decision as below.

our fight is based on our data, our copright...

i also found hours ago, this irish related ISP piracy
http://www.edri.org/edrigram/number6...-isp-filtering

that lead to this
http://www.digitalrights.ie/2008/03/...is-a-bad-idea/
were it gives some costs and other information we might take note of in the 'profiling for profit' fight.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

http://www.iii.co.uk/investment/deta...ommunity&it=le

So 38% of Phorm investors also have shares in Northern Rock. Canny lot.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

I've responded too and it's in the queue as well.

Come on people, get there and slap Phorm down! The more people put them down on every appearance they try and make the more people will realise what a scam outfit Phorm is.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

I just laughed so much I nearly wet myself!

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Is there some way of finding out who the corporate investors in Phorm are? If, for example, a well known supermarket chain is a shareholder then there might well be potential for a letter & e-mail campaign...

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

You can get basic details using the free search at Companies House

http://www.companieshouse.gov.uk/

No shareholder details though.

I don't know if any of the 'paid-for' services will access the shareholder register. Certainly for a private ltd company, the shareholder details have to be returned to Companies House. I don't know about public ones. Also, the parent is American, so I don't know how that affects things. I'll try to find out more.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

hmm , do we have yet another bit of legislation to add to the DPA ,RIPA,Copyright already considered.

or is that just for the irish law, is there also an english or UK wide version.

http://www.irishstatutebook.ie/1983/...#zza24y1983s98
Postal and Telecommunications Services Act, 1983

Prohibition on interception of telecommunications messages. 98.—(1) A person who—
( a ) intercepts or attempts to intercept, or
( b ) authorises, suffers or permits another person to intercept, or
( c ) does anything that will enable him or another person to intercept,
telecommunications messages being transmitted by the company or who discloses the existence, substance or purport of any such message which has been intercepted or uses for any purpose any information obtained from any such message shall be guilty of an offence.

(2) Subsection (1) shall not apply to any person who is acting—
( a ) (i) for the purpose of an investigation by a member of the Garda SÃÂÂ*ochána of a suspected offence under section 13 of the Post Office (Amendment) Act, 1951 (which refers to telecommunications messages of an obscene, menacing or similar character) on the complaint of a person claiming to have received such a message, or
(ii) in pursuance of a direction issued by the Minister under section 110, or
(iii) under other lawful authority, or
( b ) in the course of and to the extent required by his operating duties or duties for or in connection with the installation or maintenance of a line, apparatus or equipment for the transmission of telecommunications messages by the company.

( 3 ) ( a ) The company may, with the consent of the Minister, make regulations to carry out the intentions of this section in so far as concerns members of its staff.
( b ) The Minister, after consultation with the company, may direct the company to make regulations under paragraph (a) or to amend or revoke regulations made under that paragraph and the company shall comply with that direction.
( c ) A person who contravenes any regulation under this subsection shall be guilty of an offence.

( 4 ) ( a ) The Minister may make regulations prohibiting the provision or operation of overhearing facilities in relation to any apparatus (including private branch telephone exchanges) connected to the network of the company otherwise than in accordance with such conditions as he considers to be reasonable and prescribes in the regulations.

( b ) A person who contravenes any regulation under this subsection shall be guilty of an offence.

(5) In this section, "interception" means listening to, or recording by any means, or acquiring the substance or purport of, any telecommunications message without the agreement of the person on whose behalf that message is transmitted by the company and of the person intended by him to receive that message.

"

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

VM, I strongly suggest you stop using that phrase "keep their internet experience just as it is now" because it ****** your customers off when you patronize them like that.

Oh, sure, on the surface, it may appear that our internet experience hasn't changed when we opt-out of Phorm (after all, we'll still get the pages we asked for, and no Phorm targeted ads), but behind the scenes, all of our web browsing is still being re-routed through the profilers (and no, I don't care that you promise "not to relay any information outside the VM network")

Stop treating your customers like mugs: we realise that you intend to still profile our data even if we "opt-out" and even if you honour your claim not to pass profile information on to Phorm, you can still quite easily use that information for other "internal" purposes, and I do not agree to my data being used in any such way.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

remember people, we have this: tell your friends, use it.
“UK consumers wake up to privacy”
link: http://www.ico.gov.uk/upload/documents/pressreleases/2008/information_rights_press_release_final1.pdf
For a copy of the ‘Data Protection Guide for Dummies’ please go to http://www.ico.gov.uk
Our data protection rights
• An organisation should tell you what it is going to do with your information before you provide any details unless this is obvious

• Your information should only be used for the reason it was collected in the first place (unless you give your consent to your information being used in other ways)

• An organisation should not collect any information which is unnecessary. You only need to provide the basic information which is required to deliver the service required

• Your information should be kept accurate and up to date – if you ask any organisation to make changes to your details, it should do this

• An organisation should not keep your details if they are no longer needed

• An organisation must provide you with copies of all information held on you - if you ask. You can also ask an organisation to stop using your personal information if it is causing you damage or distress or if you wish to stop it being used for marketing purposes.

• An organisation must keep your personal information secure at all times

• An organisation should not transfer your personal details to another country unless adequate data protection arrangements are in place.
and then it goes on to say….

David Smith said: “For any of us to have trust in an organisation we must be confident that our information is held securely and processed in line with data protection rules.

If we all regularly start to ask the right questions then organisations will respond to public demand and take the protection of our personal information more seriously.

If organisations fail to recognise the importance of data protection they not only risk losing business. They could also face action from the ICO.”

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

one question which seems to not been asked is if a person opts out. Phorm still intending to use a mirror for profiling. If I opted out and they say I will NOT get adverts during browsing or see these adverts Why the heck do they still need to profile opted out people.

I wish one these PR persons Answers that million dollar question. No-one thought about this.

What will they get out of this profiling if we wish Not to get spammed with online adverts.

I think you start to think covertly whats intended.

So will they be able to get our names & address from the ISP if not they do trace attacks. In the end they would likely find our hometown, our address and you can bet phorm will give us snail targeted junk or even targeted email once its known.

I cant think why else would they want to still profile an opted out individual. It makes absolute no sense for phorm to even want to profile opted out people. The only other conclusion is for spy reasons Government etc or hacking purposes.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Maybe to make it easier to serve ads if an opted-out user has a brain-dead moment and changes their mind and opts in at a later date?

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

ill repeate:
NO company can lawfully collect, profile,store or export your personal data without your consent to do so, under the DPA....

---------- Post added at 02:25 ---------- Previous post was at 02:12 ----------

ohh 27

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Unfortunately, legally all that would be needed for our consent, is a change in the T&C and notification that the T&C had changed, and then our continued use of the service.

I am aware from postings here that an advisory group has opinioned that this is not sufficient in their view, and that explicit consent should be sought. There is also the argument that web sites haven't agreed to an interception of their pages (and if the site is password protected may have their own T&C that forbids interception), but there is also a counter-argument to this. Has any of this been tested in court, I doubt it.

I also very much dislike web based T&C, such as Virgin Media's T&C, because they are put onto web sites, without any form of checksum and independent way of verifying that the contents have not changed. If we don't already do so, we should be saving the T&C and AUP to files on our hard drive to be able to later verify what has changed. (I bet most of us haven't!)

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

When I first joined I did print mine out but it was over 20 pages of legal talk that seemed to cotriudict itself later on. I did finaly throw this away after they kept changing them. I have had at least one copy sent through the post but this was a few years back and print so small you need a page magnifier to read it or telescope. :D

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

I always think T&C's are sham. You cant exactly say no and still use the item. How many times can you legally buy a piece software and say NO and still install it.

OF1975 Could be but it still strange action if they are to only keep this data the length they say. It also lays into mistrust of the whole system.

If we forget, accidently or even malware deletes the opt out we can be done.

I still think if they want to claim they are honest there is NO need for opted out to have there data mirrored still. It slimy way to run things.

Then again pc industry done it for years like the T&C's you have to be forced to accept if you want to use the purchase you bought.

You cant read often the T&C's before purchase either.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Florence, I think it took me somewhere in the order of 2.5 hrs to complete the online order for VM BB, because I spent sometime trying to read the T&C and AUP.

Mertle, they may indeed feel biased towards the supplier, but it is still worth reading the clauses that cover things like the length of lock-in to the service, any penalty payments for leaving early, etc, so that you know what you are about to buy. Also I think the consumer does have some protection against unfair clauses in contracts - things could apparently be a lot worse.

Agree entirely about the situation with shrink wrap and T&C. We could also add some software is not Fit for purpose.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Hi Everyone

I'm a new member of this forum and I confess I haven't read every single message concerning this contentious issue. Please forgive me if I cover a topic that has already been exhausted.

CW's decision to sign up with Phorm was regrettable. However, they should be given some credit for giving a relatively prompt assurance that they will not mirror, intercept or permit Phorm surveillance of data unless the customer concerned actively chooses to opt in.

Virgin's vague marketing type statement about customers being able to keep their Internet experience just as it is now simply isn't good enough. Virgin need to make some clear unambiguous statements that properly address all the legitimate concerns put to them by their customers. Perhaps, Virgin would do well to consider the potential damage caused by a further erosion of customer confidence if they continue their deafening silence on this topic.

Does anyone have any idea of what Virgin's obligations are concerning their "provisional" contract with Phorm? It would be helpful to know what they mean by provisional and whether or not they could become liable to pay damages for breach of contract.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

sounds a good idea

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

If i receive the same answer as this from the registered letter i sent then i will be sending a non compliance letter to the data protection registrar. They have NOT addressed the request that I made in my letter and email and therefor in my eye's are in NON Compliance.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Sirius,

Although we haven't seen what you sent them, and although I agree with what you want, I can't see how VM can be guilty of non-compliance at this time. Non-compliance of what? Phorm isn't live, nor do VM know when it will go live, or even how they are going to implement it, or even if they are going to implement it!

How can someone be guilty in the present, of a possible non-compliance of something that may or may not happen, in a presently unknown way at some unknown time in the future?

They can't.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

I asked them to confirm that they had received and noted on my account the fact that i do not, will not and have not given them permission to use my data or to pass my data through a profiling device. I asked them to confirm that they had done this even if they have not started to profile. They have not confirmed at this time that they has carried out my request to update my account notes.

The fact that they sent a standard ******** letter is what has annoyed me the most. They could not even be bothered to answer any of the questions that was asked and they did not carry out my instructions

When i issue a NON compliance i will also request a complete copy of my account information as stored on there computers. I will pay them the £10.00 that is needed for that.

The whole point of my letter is to let them understand that we as customers will not role over and allow them to sell our private data to a company that is in my eye's nothing more than a spywere company that i have been infected by before in there previous life as 121 media..

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Knew I did the right thing I abandon ship Bt line here this Friday ASAP sign up to ADSL supplier who has assured me they have no intentions of joining phorm since owner also uses the network and he wouldn't like his clicks watched and profiled.. :)

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

hence the reason you are wise to send that registered data protection act Notice laying out how they can use your Personal data from that point on.

if you want to be padantic, every time they change the T&C , you simply re-send a Notice referencing the original and stating its still in effect.

your DPA Notice always overrides any change regarding personal data they might place in the T&C at any point...

your data, your rules, and how they may or not, use any part of your property.

---------- Post added at 18:31 ---------- Previous post was at 18:20 ----------

and remember Florence, if and when you sign that paper contract, read the T&C, crossout and inital any clause you dont like.

you can even add any clauses you might want ;) and once you sign it, and the company rep signs and witnesses it, they activate and you use the service , thats it, contract confirmed, remember people , that signed T&C works for both partys :angel:

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

UCTA 77

Under section 11(1) of the Unfair Contract Terms Act 1977, in order to satisfy the ‘requirement of reasonableness’, the term must have been a fair and reasonable one to have included in the contract having regard to all the circumstances which were or ought reasonably have been known to, or in the contemplation of the parties when the contract was made. In other words, the ‘time-frame’ against which the assessment is made is that of the making of the contract and the actual breach is not relevant to the reasonableness of an exemption clause, merely potential breaches within the reasonable contemplation of the parties when they contracted. The burden of proof lies on the person seeking to rely upon the clause to show that it is reasonable (s11(5)). There are guidelines on reasonableness in schedule 2. They are only relevant by 'legislative prescription' when the requirement of reasonableness is applied by sections 6 or 7, but they are a list of factors which the courts have recognised to be generally factually relevant to the requirement of reasonableness, under whichever section it is applied (eg Phillips Products Ltd v Hyland [1987] 2 All ER 620, p 628). There is also further specific guidance as to the treatment of clauses which limit liability in section 11(4). In relation to such clauses, regard is to be had to the resources available to the person seeking to rely on the clause to meet potential liability and how far it was open to that party to obtain insurance cover. In general, the courts have indicated the relevance of considering the insurance situation eg whether the exemption clause placed the risk of some problem with performance on the person best able to insure and whether the allocation of the need to insure was reflected in the contract price.(2) The application of the ‘requirement of reasonableness’ is basically a weighing process, with the various factors indicating the reasonableness, or otherwise, of the clause, being put in the scales with an appropriate weighting. (On the requirement of reasonableness generally see Macdonald, 1999a)

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

:welcome: Mesmer, your not that No.27 are you ;)
i dont remember any such official 'will not mirror, intercept or permit Phorm surveillance of data' statement, but perhaps i missed it ?

regarding the provisional comercial contract, YES thats exactly what i thought.

there MUST be something in that signed contract that will cost them dearly, otherwise you would expect them to run the numbers and come to the conclusion its not werth the loss at this time.

apparently it would seem, given the VM hush,they are infact in deep on the cash and related front if they back out now.

perhaps if and when Virgin Media run a Phorm trial, that gives them some breathing room!

OC as i pointed out above somewere, Neil couldnt really be held to a comercial contract or its cash liabilitys that deemed they act unlawfully could they.

perhaps he's waiting to see something with a legal stamp, VM do keep quoting the vague nothing will be put in place for a long time ,it seems they are just waiting for one of the others to break or give them a way out perhaps.

---------- Post added at 19:18 ---------- Previous post was at 18:43 ----------

thats the ticket Sirius, let them know your ready to use your power of official Notice :angel:

you will have to wait the alotted time frame (40 days was it, although i think it may be less , someone needs to check that official timeframe perhaps)though before you can action a non compliance.

and sending a DPA request for 'any and all' :angel: data held by return post, and in human readable form (thats a LOT of data,paper and time for a £10) before the time lines up, means they might not have actioned the notice before the DPA request arrived.

sure, we all know they should have, but they can use that defense if they like , they have no such option if you wait the full time allowed per letter though.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Many thanks for your welcome. If I am number 27 then I must have clicked the wrong thing in error! I didn't because there is absolutely no way that I would ever agree to a company like Phorm profiling my data. I've always taken care to ensure malware programs are denied access to my computer. If there was some way to apply Spybot S&D to Virgin's equipment I would be one of the first to be standing in line.

You are correct that I was paraphrasing CW. I believe they did state that data would not touch any Phorm supplied equipment unless you were foolhardy enough to opt in.

I was trying to be charitable to Virgin in suggesting that they might have contractual obligations as a consequence of their ill-advised dealings. On the other hand, CW's statement and BT's trial statement suggests that they could offer a default opt out completely bypassing Phorm's data interception equipment without breaching whatever contract they have if one assumes that the three contracts were similar. This may or may not be the case. The less charitable interpretation is that they are determined to impose this because they have scant regard for their customers’ privacy and wish to maximise financial gains arising from their new targeted advertising venture.

My understanding is that contracts for illegal or immoral purposes are void. It seems reasonable to assume that Virgin could escape from their contractual obligations without penalty if it can be shown that the data interception is illegal. The big question is whether or not Virgin care about their customers.

In my view, the object lesson for all companies is that they should devote fewer resources to marketing and redeploy that effort to provide the people that pay them and keep them in business with a product or service that is second to none.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

If the ISP (and Phorm) stick to the view that none of your personal data is being sent to Phorm, whilst nicely mis-directing the ICO away from the profiling equipment installed in the ISP network, what good is the DPA notice if all your IP traffic is still going to go through that profiling equipment?

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

If they're 'allowed' to break the law, then of course our legal 'rights' under that law are useless.
(Although I'm fairly sure that it would be appealled pretty fast -- the minor publicity storm has attracted some powerful supporters.)

And even if we 'win' the right to keep Phorm away from our clickstreams, I wouldn't be at all surprised if this is only the first, stumbling attempt at (ab)using our browsing/connection data.
I suspect that it's worth too much money for them to leave it alone.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

If they end up with less customers through this thye wil have less customer clicks to earn them money..

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

thanks to admin in the DRI blog, iv had this response

"popper - The Open Rights Group seem to be on top of the Phorm issue. Unless we find out that an Irish ISP is deploying the technology, I don’t think DRI has much to add. The provision you’ve cited on that thread is limited to Irish law. RIPA is a much more complex statute. Incidentally, the underlying European law is the privacy in telecommunications directive, 2002/58/EC, which you might like to have a look at if you haven’t already. "

time to look at 2002/58/EC now....

---------- Post added at 22:42 ---------- Previous post was at 22:19 ----------

its an interesting question, plenty of questions ,not many answers.

we need more legally trained points of view here, so i posted a few questions and POV in a few places today and pointed them to this thread.

so hello and :welcome: if your reading as one of the 14 guests, come join us,take the poll, and help us understand the finer points of Uk and EU law as it relates to this ISP/Phorm/users deal.

well flowrebmit, theres the EU DC 'ip is your personal data' OC, so if you instruct them to not send your data to any profiling electronic device such as any Phorm supplyed or gifted kit perhaps thats enough.

as you imply, you cant assume the ICO knows, so make sure the UK ICO knows fully about the notice and what the Phorm Box is and does, how its gifted over a standard 5 year plan as we understand it from public information etc.

if its still being directed (a data protection act request on that, might show that fact in a log of your dataflow perhaps?)to the Phorm profiling for profit boxs then thats then a matter for the ICO to look at as part of the non compliance you send it would seem.

would the ISP (because we are talking about several ISPs right not just VM) really risk the ICO (temp)removing their DPA licence once they understand thats a very real option open to the Data Commissioners as a sanction....!

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Under DPA, what law have they broken?

A hypothetical example, if British Telecom, under the DPA registered that they were going to process and store only the names and addresses of their customers. If a customer makes a call from their BT phone to a Mail order company, as part of the conversation the customer gives the Mail order firm their name, address and credit card, has BT broken the law?

I only have limited knowledge on the DPA, and there have been a lot of messages in this thread, so the question is - was the DPA ever meant to cover transmission of Personal Data by a communication company?

If this abuse becomes widespread, then one possible future, is that http use will die out and https (secure/encrypted) will be adopted as the norm for web pages.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Early on, articles were reporting that BT was expecting to make £80million/year from Phorm -- that's just a shade over 75,000 users paying £20/mth.
So if less than 75k users dump BT Retail because of Phorm, they'll still be making a profit!
I don't have equivalent figures for VM but I'm sure somewhere deep in VM Towers, somebody will have done just that calculation... probably several times!
It's money for old rope, apart from the PR nosedive.

The advertising world really likes the idea of targetted ads by profiling and reckons it's worth countless billions.
If we beat them down this time, I suspect they'll be back.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

So to do this if it nets that kind of money I would expect my BB for free since my sufing and search habits would be paying for my connection.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

indeed Florence, its a wonder (or perhaps not :erm: )they dont sign a comercial contract with you for copywrite legal protection to use your data.

remember though, you will only get perhaps 2/5th of that as they also need to sign a comercial contract with the other webserver party you contact to be sure to not be liable for comercial copywrite piracy there as well.

and to top it off, for full legal coverage, they need to channel you both into a so called 'walled garden' subset of the web to be totally sure they are not leaking their interception for profit into the real interweb were they might collect and process websites and clean users un-authorised....

ohh wait..., after paying out all the extra expenses for accepting this free Phorm box, that doesnt sound like they will have much cashflow left out of their share of this cashcow after all.

not such a good,legal and profitable business plan after all then..... :rolleyes: or is it !
my property :)

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

I agree with this 100%. Phorm is not really the issue, if they go belly up tomorrow, somebody else will take their place 6 months down the line.

The ISP's have to be stopped from ever getting involved with anything like this, ever again. Although this one may be won over a point of law or something like that, I believe only 2 things can kill the idea off :-

1) Governement intervention (ha ha), but they might if they think there are a lot of votes at stake.

2) Mass public protest.

Both boil down to essentially the same thing, this issue must go mainstream.

8k votes on the Downing Street website is nothing. Compare to how many internet users there are?

A BBC article that is no longer visible?

Clear cut informed opinion against, but not exactly mass market publications (The Register).

Yes, keep on doing what everybody here is doing. Talk the thing down at every opportunity. Explore using the law etc.

But, this campaign must go mainstream if we are to kill off the issue once and for all.

Now, how do we best do that?

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

To the best of our knowledge neither Virgin Media or Carphone Wharehouse have yet to break the law but BT and Phorm almost certainly did by carrying out a trial on their users without obtaining consent of ANY sort last summer. Its quite clear that under RIPA consent has to be obtained and not only was consent NOT obtained but BT even lied about it at the time and denied anything was going on. Secondly, its questionable as to whether Phorm had even complied with the DPA at the time as I dont think they had registered with the Data Protection Registrar.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Sorry OF1975, the board cuts off quotes within quotes so it's difficult to follow the conversation. Hope this makes it clearer...

So, aiui, flowrebmit is asking what if the ICO is convinced that the data VM pass to Phorm really *is* sufficiently anonymised? Ie. outside the scope of the DPA? (That's close enough in summary, flowrebmit?)

I wonder if the only effective protection will be to specifically extend the privacy of other forms of communication to the online sphere, making *any* interception without explicit consent or lawful warrant a criminal offence?

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Ceedee, under RIPA, any interception without consent or warrant already is a criminal offence.

Of course, whether the Phorm system, either in future or even in relation to last years secret trials with BT, breaks RIPA has yet to be tested in court but from what I understand some of those involved in the BT trials last year are already preparing a dossier to be presented to the police.

Remember RIPA is totally distinct from the DPA obligations.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Apologies.
I thought RIPA was concerned with identifiable data rather than anonymised elements of a clickstream.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

No apologies needed. Personally Identifiable data is one of the key issue regarding the data protection act. RIPA is to do with interception of communications and is a whole other ball game. As I said though, its yet to be determined in court whether Phorms system would break RIPA but experts such as the Open Rights Group, Foundation for Information Policy Research and a professor from the LSE (I cant remember who right now) all think its likely it will. When it comes to the secret trial BT/Phorm ran last year I think its almost a certainty that it DID break ripa as a key part of RIPA is consent and BT did not gain consent and even went further by denying the trial was going on at the time.

That said, it shall be interesting to see how the police react when a formal complaint is made to them.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

As a follow up, what are the impressions of a company that allows people to work from home? What do they think about home-workers accessing their systems through a 'tapped' connection?

I have FE Colleges amongst my clients. They take data protection very seriously. All would be horrified if they knew data streams would be scanned.

Increasing numbers of Colleges allow staff and students to access College e-mail remotely via web-mail. Staff may also access student records remotely.

Next week I will raise issues with them; should Institutions block access to staff and students who use Phorm enabled ISP's?

Should staff and students be advised to change ISP's or should the institutions scale down efforts to implement things like virtual learning environments, available at home? (Government policy to push these things out asap)

Finally, I will raise these issues on a closed Jiscmail group that is read by most people working in FE data processing in the country. Astonishingly, as far as I know, the issue has never been raised there.

Does anybody here work in schools? Many schools are setting up facilities for parents to view their child's attendance records etc from home. It may be that your child attends such a school. What does the school think?

Personal records of young people are rightfully a concern to everybody and need to become part of the issue.

It may well be that you can also raise concerns where you work, and thus broaden the campaign against this serious danger?

Could this be the biggest step backwards in striving towards the goal of an e-enabled society?

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

You can bet the ISP's and PHORM/121 MEDIA are hoping that by the time this roles for real that the main complaints will have subsided.

There must be constant pressure all the time.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

I'd like to know what Phorm are proposing to do for the majority of sites on the web which already have Terms & Conditions that already explicitly deny permission to mine/gather/use their data in any way.

Are they going to blacklist all sites that have T&C denying this type of use? In which case, they won't have many sites that they can use.

Here's a few examples from some popular websites (relevant parts in bold!):

Amazon.co.uk
...This licence does not include any resale or commercial use of this website or its contents; any collection and use of any product listings, descriptions, or prices; any derivative use of this website or its contents; any downloading or copying of account information for the benefit of another merchant; or any use of data mining, robots, or similar data gathering and extraction tools.
This website or any portion of this website may not be reproduced, duplicated, copied, sold, resold, visited, or otherwise exploited for any commercial purpose without our express written consent.

Facebook
...any other use of the Site Content is strictly prohibited. Such license is subject to these Terms of Use and does not include use of any data mining, robots or similar data gathering or extraction methods. Any use of the Site or the Site Content other than as specifically authorized herein, without the prior written permission of Company, is strictly prohibited and will terminate the license granted herein. Such unauthorized use may also violate applicable laws including copyright and trademark laws and applicable communications regulations and statutes.

The BBC
...You may not copy, reproduce, republish, disassemble, decompile, reverse engineer, download, post, broadcast, transmit, make available to the public, or otherwise use bbc.co.uk content in any way except for your own personal, non-commercial use. You also agree not to adapt, alter or create a derivative work from any bbc.co.uk content except for your own personal, non-commercial use.

Have a quick look at the T&C for just about any popular site and chances are that they'll already have paragraphs similar to the above.

If these sites make their money from running their own advertising scheme, subscription fees etc. do you think they'd be too happy that Phorm are mining the data from every page of theirs that we visit so they can make a profit? I wouldn't be.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Very interesting perspective, mrjolly.
Thanks for your insight!

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

I wonder how many websites with similar rules had them broken with the illegal trials BT and phorm ran last year?

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Very good post thank you. But isn't the danger that such sites would be willing to alter their T&C to get their noses in the potentially lucrative Phorm trough? There's a lot of money to be shared around at our expense. Money talks. BIG MONEY SHOUTS. If Phorm is 'legal' there will be a queue with their hands open :(

would this outsmart phorm?
 

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Actually, I think then that your post may also raise the question of whether Google's search engine gathering bots are also illegal, nevermind Phorm.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Okay so once we've beaten off Phorm and got VM to promise that they'll never 'touch' our data again, we'll take on Google...

:D

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Most sites with those T&C have scripts that stop the bots going to pages they don't allow the search on but will allow a few pages of the Site owners choice to keep them in the lists for google searches to promote more traffic to their sites.

I moderate a website with similar T&C and I go into an admin area which shows some details of members which I have agreed a NDC on, phorm would break this rule for me, I cannot trust VM to allow me to surf as I do now with no one looking over my shoulder logging Big BRother style so I quit VM for an ISP that can deliver what I ask. The right to look after my own online protection and privacy.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

In most cases though it's of benefit to have your site indexed by search engines as that's one way to attract more visitors and potentially more sales. If not, the site owner can add a few meta tags or create a robots.txt page to prevent the site being crawled.

In the case of Phorm, it's the opposite. They analyse the contents of the page then display an advert for a competitor a few seconds later. The website has just lost a sale & Phorm has made a profit. There was nothing that site could do to prevent that.

Phorm could argue that they won't analyse any pages if asked by the owners, but the terms & conditions are already in saying you can't do it.

I'm not sure if everyone would want, or be able to sign up with Phorm. according to this page "I see they start their publisher info request form with traffic details - smallest on the list is 500k - 1 million - so it would seem they are targeting higher traffic sites or possibly networks." If they're using their own advertising, are a subscription site, or in the case of the BBC, not allowed to run ads then they might not!

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

If you work from home through VPN (or other form of encryption) then Phorm will not affect you, as stated in a previous post (sorry I can't be more specific!)

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Erm:) Sort of, it's whether any elements of our IP data traffic, passing through the Phorm/ISP profiling equipment, is treated as personal data by the DPA?
Many of us will know we have, at times, personal data travelling in an unencrypted IP data stream, but does the Act cover that, or is it only concerned with personal data that we explicitly give to an organisation that they use?

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Interesting to see Phorm's reply in post 797. They say the following about spyware:

While OIX doesn't install anything (apart from a cookie or two) on your PC, it can (although we have no way of knowing if it will) be configured to monitor your comms regardless of whether you have given consent or not.

Phorm is hidden. In that you don't get any visible sign you are being monitored. Even if the ads aren't being displayed, because of the way the monitoring is being done, we have know way of knowing if our browsing habits are being recorded or not. Beyond the assurances of a company that we have no knowledge of beyond the fact that it's previous products have been labelled spyware by various independant experts.

If configured to monitor your comms regardless of the opt out (which according to the presentation I have seen, it can be), Phorm would actually be impossible for the user to remove unless they change ISP.

Also, it may steal info. Again, we have only the word of Phorm that it discards personal data.

So, according to their own definition, the OIX system could be considered spyware.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

The profiling equipment wouldn't be able to scan the encrypted web pages, but what else they learn does depend on what and how much of our IP data is going to be routed into the profiling kit. If the IP headers are not altered by our ISP before they reach the profiling equipment, then the profiler will know what web site we surf to, if it were a bank then they can guess who we bank with.

Phorm have claimed that will not know about IP addresses, but it seems they won't give straight answers about what their profiling equipment can see, and prefer to twist the answer by mentioning Webwise rather than the profiling equipment.

---------- Post added at 15:01 ---------- Previous post was at 14:50 ----------

Stuart C, good observation, and hardly surprising given that they made some of their money from spyware - can a leopard really change its spots?

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Not only wont they give straight answers about the profiler but they have yet to give us any kind of answers as to what kind of information may be stored in these "research and debug logs" that they store for 14 days. This despite swearing they store no personally identifiable information.

Do we all remember what happened when AOL researchers released (accidentally? - yeah more like deliberately) supposedly anonymised search terms of over 600,000 people and it only took researchers hours to track people down and show them a list of the search terms they had used?

Until I know what will be stored in these "research and debug logs" - and lets remember the word "research" has some wide connotations - then I will not accept Phorms claim that they store no personally identifiable information.

Add to that the fact that they, along with Virgin Media, still refuse to give cast-iron answers to simple technological questions and seek to obfuscate the debate with phrases such as "if you opt-out your internet experience will remain the same" and the writing is on the wall.

Oh I cant wait for the stock market to reopen on tuesday so that I can get back to my new favourite past time of watching their share price collapse further.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Hi folks havent posted a lot on here but ive written to my mp and mep asking them to look at this so when i get a reply ill let you all know. Also theres a group on facebook too

http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=9216870661

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

"Phorm have claimed that will not know about IP addresses, but it seems they won't give straight answers about what their profiling equipment can see"

lol, phorm might not when asked,but their COO did slip up remember.

quote " As you browse, we're able to categorize all of your Internet actions ," said Virasb Vahidi, the chief operating officer of Phorm. " We actually can see the entire Internet ."

Followup to my DPA letter
 

- that is, Virgin have sent a followup. Sort of. It's from Customer Concern (in Swansea, of all places).

They seem to think the letter was a complaint about the service. Oh, come ON!!! (part II)

What is wrong with these people?! I know there are none so blind who will not see, but this is just getting stupid! Do they really think we're just going to sit still and let this abuse happen?


---------- Post added at 16:50 ---------- Previous post was at 16:08 ----------

Short answer: no, it wouldn't outsmart Phorm.

Ironkey only keeps files secure once you've got them - but all such files pass through your ISP before reaching your computer, and Ironkey can't stop that, so it doesn't do you any good. Unless I've missed something.

No, the only way around the profiling (spying, theft - hard to see the difference) if your ISP does it is to switch to an ISP that doesn't. I wonder how many parties the Bethere execs (and those of any other non-participating ISP) will be throwing when the new subscribers start signing up in their hundreds and, most likely, thousands...?

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

I'd be surprised if they didn't use the IP. After all, if the site is just one big flash movie (as some are) and contains no keywords, unless the phorm software uses the IP, then they aren't going to be able to profile your usage of that site.

Also, as I stated earlier, they could do the same profiling they are claiming they will do using just their data centre and a lot of browser side javascript and cookies. According to Phorm , Google achieve their profiling this way.

Why would Phorm spend (presumably) tens of millions of pounds installing hardware at the ISP to do the same job? Either they are hiding something(*) , or they are massively incompetant.

* Like the fact that they can monitor you even if you opt out, after all, if you opt out, they say they don't process your data, so why should it matter to them if you block them?

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

exactly, just look at the Board of directors on the Phorm payroll, all these high roll ex-CEO's, ex-COO's and bankers etc.

they obviously thought, ohh, an all we can eat window on the mug-punters data and its all MINE,i own the patent, ca-ching.

(*whispers in the back!?!?!?, whats that you say, THE LAW,ohh we dont need to worry about that here,thats the other guys problem.)

Re: Followup to my DPA letter
 

it lets you surf the web with encryption enabled like a vpn session so i think it would

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Assuming you are using a VPN or other encryption. That's a big assumption.

Alexander Hanff

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

I occasionaly do work from home volunteer work not paid work this does involve handling members data I have agreed a NDC for this but again Phorm would access this as I worked. Don't be taken in by thye hype it is for your protection this is totally wrong it is only a way to makle money of your surfing habits... You already pay for the service to access the internet so where you go is yours personal data collection and this is what they intend to use to earn money from you..

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

You access other servers on an unsecured line? Surely Phorm is the least of your worries!

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

I think phorm getting dirty folks.

Just been browsing this forum without loging on. Went off to make a cup tea and other things. Gone about roughly half hour but just kept on the browsing thread on here.


Come back and there is Alert pop up from our nice dephormation telling me of an OIX ALERT.

How is this possible. What is phorm upto back to there old malware ways.

Getting all nasty because there share going to the wall and we are now hurting them by getting ISP to rethink.

Exactly how can I get a oix cookie without browsing. I think the site needs to check if they are hacking our website to peddle there distatesful scheme.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

If you stayed on this page here then its very suspicious as there are no links even to the phorm website. On other pages of this thread there are links to the phorm website posted by their PR team for example so we would expect dephormation to trigger on those. At least I think it would. Someone correct me if am wrong please.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

I've had Dephormation throw up an alert on a few of the other threads, as some folks have links to webwise in their post or their sigs.

I don't think it's anything to be concerned with at the mo, but keep on yer toes as we all know Phorm's history on that front.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

I've been noticing double-hits on webforms, so phoned Virgin to find that Phorm has been live since the beginning of the month... Has anyone else noticed this??

Customer services, when challenged about this pointed me in the direction of webwise.com and have stated they do not have any method of opting out at present.... could be interesting...

1) Phorm appears to be live
2) Virgin do not appear to have notified the customer base about this
3) No revised T's & C's appear to be issued
4) They state they don't have an opt out

Wicked!!!

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

1)Phorm is not live on virgin media, there are plenty of links of people stating this, and i woud rather believe what i can read than what someone has been told by cs.
2) they dont need to as its not live
3) see above
4) you cant opt out of something that isnt live

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

I have no interest in making this up...

I phoned them after observing double-hits on single click authentication forms, resulting in a generic 'you have already confirmed....' when it would normally render a response of 'thank-you... your update was successful'.

Humour me.... Cust Services on 150 is free... They will put you on hold while they have a dig around... and see what their response is...

I'm happy to run external tests if needed, will IIS logs show this up??

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

It isn't live.

I know this for fact. You appear to have some other issue. It isn't live on BT or CWP either. BT are about to launch a test of the system, as are CWP. VM are no where near trialling the system.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Simple

Your wrong.

So if you think its live give us some real evidence trace routes, cookies and which site you got them from.

Finally.

I have a very very good contact within VM core networks and he has told me "and i trust him 100% as i have known him for 12 years" that they are NOT testing nor do they have PHORM running in any of there POP sites at this time.

So give us the ruddy evidence is you are so ruddy certain. I have been running checks for the last 3 weeks and have seen no evidence what so ruddy ever of phorm being tested on the VM network.


so why don't you tell us what your real problem with VM is ????? instead of making comments that you don't seem to have evidence for.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

well ,short of a few of you techs looking in the data centers of all the ISPs to make sure that no phorm kit is hooked up we cant really be that sure can we.

and being that its going to have a trial run at some point, who knows whats pluged into that new fiber the R&D room installed last year!.

if you really think somethings not right,you as an end user can OC capture all the data stream on your section as your own trial using several tools ,but your going to need to know what to look for ,and its going to take up a lot of space as a raw stream.

there are techs out there that can advise you, and plenty are looking for this phorm data now, but i suspect it might be a false positive in this case or something else.

after all, VM wouldnt be that stupid to run secret non-consented Phorm trials now that BT look to be in seriously deep doo-doo with their unlawful june/july 2007 trial, would they?.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

thanks its possible this whats happening strange it did not do it a week ago. Then agian maybe those links was not there. But what was strange Why without moving the browser it activated.

Unless the webpage auto refreshed and someone with a phorm link posted while I was away from the machine.

Thanks it did worry me but this does explain the OIX warning.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Trust me i have been running test's on my connection for the last 3 weeks and there has been no sign what so ever of Phorm on my connection. ;)

I will scream from the roof tops if i see it.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

There's a good column in today's Guardian about phorm, and web privacy in general.

http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/...ate_lives.html

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Yeticatcher, I honestly dont think even VM is stupid enough to let this go live without informing customers and obtaining consent. Not with all the controversy going on and whats happening vis-a-vis BTs secret trial of the technology last summer. That said we should remain alert.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

If I look at the thread Slow slow slow dephormation throws up an alert box, on closer inspection there is a webwise link in someone's sig.

The link to the article from the Guardian MurfitUk posted is well worth a read too.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Bondage, SM & an organisation called Backlash... :erm:

Good job we're not being profiled already... ;)

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Less than 24 hours to go and we can get back to the Phun of hopefully watching Phorms share price continue tanking. Happy days....

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

The link to the Criminal Justice and Immigration Act bill is an interesting one - it demonstrates what I said in this forum weeks ago:

Namely, once the Phorm hardware is in place, it's perfectly possible for the government to introduce new legislation, or ammend existing statutes to allow them to, quite legally, use it to analyze all UK citizen's web traffic and pick up key words and images that they consider to be "undesirable" (much as GCHQ have been doing to telephone traffic for years, under court orders). The system can then be used to build a very different kind of profile on each of us; one which I very much doubt M15 would send us in the post upon request and payment of a £10 processing fee.

Now, whilst most of us would probably agree on some of the things on their list as undesirable (child abuse, terrorism, organized crime, fraud) we unfortunately have no control over what else they choose to identify as undesirable - political affiliation, trades union activism, NGO membership, religious allegiance, sexual preference.....

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Phorm Comms Team is at it again. This time on the OIX supporting grauniad:

http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/...omment-1221420

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Love the arguement. If I send a mail to a gmail account... Well by sending the email to a gmail account I am consenting for gmail to read that mail. By my friend recieving that mail and reading it there I they are consenting. And well the mail itself contains personally identifiable information such as my email address and a conversation. V.Strange analagy IMHO.

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Not only that but there are two key issues they are missing regarding use of gmail, google search engine and other services like it:

1) Choice. People have a clear choice. We can choose whether to use their email in full knowledge of what they are doing. Its easy to spread around your browsing in other search engines so that no one company or search engine gets to see the totality of what we do. Changing Internet Provider is not so easy and in some cases, such as in rural areas, just isnt feasible at all.

2) Quid Pro Quo If I allow google to profile me via using gmail I am actually receiving a useful service in return. I get large storage and the convenience of easy to use web based email.

There is absolutely no quid pro quo with Phorm and their webwise. "Relevant and targetted ads" arent a benefit to me as I ignore online ads. If I want to buy something online then I will go look for it myself, thank you very much. Secondly, the much spun "antiphishing" technology is nothing that isnt already available in IE7 and Firefox.

On another point I am getting really peeved with the Phorm spin that this is somehow an advancement in privacy because they are at least trying to anonymise data. They point their fingers at google and say look what they are doing. They store data blah blah. To use an analogy, it just makes me think of two peeping-toms peeking into someones house and one (Phorm) points to the other and says "Look how bad HE is. Hes snooping with both eyes open. We only snoop with one of our eyes open."

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Another example of advertisers over-stepping their bounds. Presumably, those poor Chinese customers weren't offered a proper opt-out either...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7311242.stm

The mobile company affected has said it will block adverts from 7 advertising companies involved.

A Chinese government official has been quoted as saying ""We urge parties concerned to beef up self-scrutiny to correct their wrongdoing, which is profit driven in defiance of public interests"

It's a sad day when the Chinese government speaks out for it's citizens' privacy more than the UK government sticks up for ours. (are you listening, Virgin Media?)

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

Phorm Comms Team has returned to the wordpress site again:

http://understrictembargo.wordpress....-of-pr-crisis/

Re: Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]
 

My understanding was that the RIPA (2000) was introduced so that the police state had sweeping powers to spy on us. I think it ironic that this Act might be a way of stopping Phorm.