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

[notophorm]

hi all,

A small update, Emma at BT no longer loves me.

After 2 nice messages which just repeat that BT have taken le le gal advice, and the system does not breach copyright.

I informed her that the advice I had been given was the opposite.

I have been advised today that a quick and easy solution once Webwise /Phorm is put into trial.

Issue an invoice for damages regarding copyright breach.

BT will not pay, at this point.

Re-issue the invoice giving a reasonable amount of time for payment, inform them, that non-payment will result in county court action.

BT will not pay.

Issue a summons for payment in the small claims court.

When BT are asked to enter a defence, they will more then likely pay up.

IF BT enter a defence the legal advice we hear so much about, but do not see would more then likely be asked for by the Judge.

Emma most kindly asked me my website details so it could be excluded, however I see a few £££ signs which would keep me in beer for many a long year, so I declined. Unfortunatly she will not write back to me.

Something I said maybe.?

The best advice I have been given, is as web masters, we have strong legal rights.

One tactic could be that even before any future tests are done, we can cost BT a lot of money and resources just by asking lots and lots of questions, and if possible attempt to tie up the legal department.

So Lots of questions, need asking, and lack of answers may strengthen a case at the small claims court in the future.

---------- Post added at 03:01 ---------- Previous post was at 02:53 ----------

Hi

I should have said, the above advice was given to me over the phone by the solicitor I contacted last week regarding this matter through my union membership.

It is a summery of a conversation and I made rubbish notes.

[Privacy_Matters]

For those who have not yet noticed, members from badphorm are debating with a Marketing Agency Employee - whose Company, iCrossing, are considering using Phorm. It should be noted that the Company in question are subject to the same sort of debate internally, and appear to be open to the debate.

They are meeting with Phorm to discuss the matter, and you may wish to pose a few questions for the them to put to Phorm:

http://www.daxthink.com/2008/07/well...-evil-and.html

badphorm Link:

http://www.badphorm.co.uk/e107_plugi...pic.php?7708.0

Please ensure that your comments are constructive, and can be presented to Phorm. Additionally, note the update on the blog.

[Rchivist]

Originally Posted by madslug

Does anybody know when the BT servers are 'rebooted'. I would expect it to be somewhere between 2 am and 4 am.
Even if they are only sending out 10k invites on the 24 hour notice, most mail systems will fall over if more than 50 emails are sent out per batch so it will take a few hours to send out all those advance warning messages.

Send customers emails? That isn't BT's style. If the information is stuff customers NEED then BT don't bother with an email, they just use a press release and put something on an obscure webpage.
We only get emails for the latest offers in BT shop!

Good grief madslug - you'll be expecting them to tell support staff next.

[Dephormation]

Originally Posted by ImaJack

Thanks for the explanation of TOR.

Because this is way above my head do any of you who responded to my question mind if I cut and paste the relevant parts and and post them on the other message board?

Certainly, please do.

Key advice is this;

The easiest way to avoid Phorm is simply moving to a Phorm free ISP.

You could also include these quotes;
“The message has to be this: if you care about your privacy, do not use BT, Virgin or Talk-Talk as your internet provider”
- Professor Ross Anderson, Cambridge University, UK (source)

"I would want to use an ISP that doesn't [monitor which websites I go to]. I personally want to feel free."
- Sir Tim Berners Lee, Inventor of the World Wide Web, Director of the World Wide Web Consortium (source)

[rryles]

Originally Posted by Peter N

Here's a copy of the diagram Madslug refers to - this will save anyone from having to visit the Webwise site.

I really dislike this diagram. It seems to be trying to represent data flow and control flow at the same time. I find it very uninformative. Of course its purpose isn't to inform me, it is a PR tool.

[Florence]

I have just posted this on BT Beta forums and thought I had best share it with you guys..

Perhaps a reason for the delays is they are starting to learn the difference between Google and people being web wise/phormed.

I was re reading the information especially the ones from Emma where she seemed to missunderstand interception and bot crawling...

Crawling is the process by which Googlebot discovers new and updated pages to be added to the Google index.

We use a huge set of computers to fetch (or "crawl") billions of pages on the web. The program that does the fetching is called Googlebot (also known as a robot, bot, or spider). Googlebot uses an algorithmic process: computer programs determine which sites to crawl, how often, and how many pages to fetch from each site.

Google's crawl process begins with a list of web page URLs, generated from previous crawl processes, and augmented with Sitemap data provided by webmasters. As Googlebot visits of each these websites it detects links on each page and adds them to its list of pages to crawl. New sites, changes to existing sites, and dead links are noted and used to update the Google index.

Google doesn't accept payment to crawl a site more frequently, and we keep the search side of our business separate from our revenue-generating AdWords service.

Now Phorm will not have any information about the sites until a paying customer types the url in the browser and Phorm intercepts the connection. Since Phorm say this interception will anonymise you also I took this definitioin.

Risks of using anonymous proxy servers

In using a proxy server (for example, anonymizing HTTP proxy), all data sent to the service being used (for example, HTTP server in a website) must pass through the proxy server before being sent to the service, mostly in unencrypted form. It is therefore possible, and has been demonstrated, for a malicious proxy server to record everything sent to the proxy: including unencrypted logins and passwords.

By chaining proxies which do not reveal data about the original requester, it is possible to obfuscate activities from the eyes of the user's destination. However, more traces will be left on the intermediate hops, which could be used or offered up to trace the user's activities. If the policies and administrators of these other proxies are unknown, the user may fall victim to a false sense of security just because those details are out of sight and mind.

The bottom line of this is to be wary when using proxy servers, and only use proxy servers of known integrity (e.g., the owner is known and trusted, has a clear privacy policy, etc.), and never use proxy servers of unknown integrity. If there is no choice but to use unknown proxy servers, do not pass any private information (unless it is properly encrypted) through the proxy.

Now I ask the question with Phorm in charge of such a network of servers just how lucky do you feel that your personal data is safe in the BT/Phorm bedroom?

[pseudonym]

Originally Posted by madslug

Since I enabled browser logging and started looking at browser requests and server responses in those logs, I find that some tracking scripts are setting cookies even though they are what I would think of as 3rd party scripts / cookies. For example, scripts called from tracker.domain.tld are setting cookies in the domain domain.tracker.tld. Some even go so far as to set cookies for domain.tracker2.tld.
(Most cookies are set when images are called so surfing without images greatly reduces the risk of cookies, even when javascript is enabled.
Visit bt.com home page.
Without images, bt.com only sets cookies in the domain .bt.com.
With images enabled, the home page sets cookies in the domains:- .doubleclick.net, .2o7.net, btow.touchclarity.com, .bt.com.

Not for me with third party cookies blocked in Opera or firefox 3.

With third party cookies blocked - IE, Safari and firefox allow cookies to be accessed after a redirect to a third party site (which Phorm relies on to access its webwise.net cookies).

IE 7 also leaks third party cookies using other methods with third party cookies blocked.

There's a "cookie forensics" test here, unfortunately it doesn't test if cookies can be set after a redirect to a third party domain - which Opera would pass, but IE, Safari and Firefox 3 would fail

http://www.grc.com/cookies/cookies.htm

[phormwatch]

I'm disappointed no one has decided to join in:

>BT/Webwise Topic on Save As... forum started yesterday.

>http://www.filesaveas.co.uk/cgi-bin/...1217334228/1#1

IMO, we need to concentrate more on getting the message out to the public.

[Tharrick]

Originally Posted by phormwatch

I'm disappointed no one has decided to join in:

>BT/Webwise Topic on Save As... forum started yesterday.

>http://www.filesaveas.co.uk/cgi-bin/...1217334228/1#1

IMO, we need to concentrate more on getting the message out to the public.

Page not found

The page you were looking for couldn't be found.

We'd like to fix this. Please use the Contact us form to report the problem.

[phpscott]

Try this http://www.filesaveas.co.uk/cgi-bin/...num=1217334228

[Tharrick]

Yes, that one works

[Rchivist]

Originally Posted by phormwatch

I'm disappointed no one has decided to join in:

>BT/Webwise Topic on Save As... forum started yesterday.

>http://www.filesaveas.co.uk/cgi-bin/...1217334228/1#1

IMO, we need to concentrate more on getting the message out to the public.

Don't be! I've put up a link to my Welcome post.
I'm beginning to see more new names on BT Beta. This thing is growing.

The link to filesaveas isn't working for me - getting 404 Not Found errors.

[Rchivist]

Originally Posted by R Jones

Here is a copy of my original letter to BT Retail counsel, to go with the reply.
http://tinyurl.com/6yzh5b

My original letter to BT Retail legal counsel here http://tinyurl.com/6yzh5b

And at long last - a text-based pdf of their reply that you can copy and paste from - the earlier ones were image based.

http://tinyurl.com/632hyt

BT have given permission to publish, so quote away to your hearts content. As they have permitted it to go on the internet I imagine we can sell it, analyse it, profile it for advertisers, make souvenir copies and sell them at a profit, use the logo and write our own phorged letters purporting to be from Greg Hughes, and generally exploit it for commercial gain - after all it's on the internet so it's anyone's!
(Well - according to BT's version of coyright law anyway.)

Watching BT watching us (or rather trying desperately to work out how to watch us without getting banged up for it).
Waiting for the trials....

The trial due to arrive "soon" at an ISP near you is the long delayed March 2008 BT Webwise trial, destined for the entire internet, now running five months late. We apologise for the late arrival of this trial, which is due to legal and technical difficulties we just couldn't be bothered to research properly.
Please enable cookies, and stand away from the edge of the computer. This trial will not be stopping to ask your permission. All carriages are equipped with the latest deep packet inspection equipment. We wish you a rewarding and Webwise-enhanced premium browsing experience.

[Wildie]

you what enhance premium browsing more like a big down grade and backwards before A.B (adblockers)