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

[Dephormation]

What a small world it is.

Perhaps we should label this emergent cabal the 'Phirm'.

(Cue, "I've come to fix the Phirm!" "Phirm? We do not have a Phirm").

Phrases like pump and dump spring to mind.

[Frank Rizzo]

Googling for "Ertugrul" to find out about connections with the Times.

Nothing found yet but have found an interesting article from the NY Times in 1999. Apologies if this has already been posted amongst the 605 pages already.

Lifetimes of Memories Preserved on CD-ROM's by Kent

The company, Life.com, has recently released a CD-ROM called My Life that encourages people to assemble their memories, thoughts and long-held secrets into a multimedia memoir. My Life asks people to select a electronic cards from 230 categories, like ''Creativity'' or ''As a child.'' Each card poses questions that range from practical to probing. One asks: ''What is the flat-out stupidest thing you have ever done?''

''We went through a lot of research to make the questions interesting in and of themselves,'' said Kent Ertugrul, the company's founder

[warescouse]

Originally Posted by AlexanderHanff

cut...
As for the trials, they are apparently due to start next week but the date could be pushed back again. I have been told these are technical trials not commercial and a total of four advertising companies will be providing the ads.
..cut
Alexander Hanff

May I suggest that when we do find out if this is true we also turn a little heat on the admin departments of those participating companies. I for one have already decided that I will be leaving / unsubscribing any company I have dealings with who join the OIX and also participate in any trials or services. Before I go, where applicable, I will ask for my £10 worth of personal data for the sheer hell of it! Can somebody remind me how I do that, nearer the time?

[popper]

Originally Posted by Blackbeak

Ok, one thing I would like to add. IP address is NOT PII in any legal act. It may one day become PII but it is not classed as such yet.

I have changed my position based on legal papers presented to me by Dr Clayton. My last comment on the subject was:

I defer to the legal analysis of Nicholas Bohm and retract (though I’ll leave the full original post here for the record) my previous comments. I now agree that a full investigation should be carried out.

If laws have been broken then I agree with you that BT should be prosecuted on your second point for all the reasons you mentioned.

My understanding without any evidence to the contrary (indeed the Home Office/ICO seemed satisfied) was that section 18 of Nicholas Bohms’ document was satisfied. I refer to this section:

“RIPA s3 is relevant to whether that interception can be lawful. RIPA s3(1) makes it lawful if the interception has the consent of both sender and recipient (or if the interceptor has reasonable grounds for believing
that it does).”

My understanding based on your document was that this was satisfied by getting consent from both the consumer and the advertising network.



I don't think anyone in my industry agrees with deception and therefore I will write another post to re-iterate my position.

thats what the Art.29 Data Protection Working Party is for...

see
http://ec.europa.eu/justice_home/fsj...s/index_en.htm

there are some new news entrys, for instance
External Experts

• Call for expressions of interest with a view to setting up a group of experts to reflect on the Data Protection legal framework in the European Union ("The Data Protection expert group" hereafter the GEX DP ") (PDF File 31 KB)
  • Terms of Reference of experts to reflect on the Data Protection legal framework in the European Union (PDF File 10 KB)
  • Application form (PDF File 40 KB)

and perhaps The Working Party should also give interested parties the opportunity to submit their comments about End users and webmasters rights to protection against DPI Interception for profit by the ISPs.


http://ec.europa.eu/justice_home/fsj...m#consultwp147
Data protection issues related to intellectual property rights

The Working Party 29 has adopted a working document on data protection issues related to intellectual property rights (Working Document 104) adopted on January 18th, 2005.

The working document recalls the application of the main data protection principles contained in the data protection Directive (Directive 95/46/EC) in the following two scenarios: First, in the deployment of on-line services using the so-called digital management of rights systems (“DRMs”).

Second, in the processing of personal data to conduct investigations of users suspected of copyright infringement.

The Working Party wishes to give interested parties the opportunity to submit their comments to the Working Document 104 and to this end it has launched this public consultation until March 31st, 2005 [closed]. The comments received by then will be posted on the present website unless a specific request not to do so is mentioned by the respondent.
Contributions received

[bluecar1]

just seen posted over on iii 19:28

phormukPR ??

anyone care to respond?? i am sure a few will rise to the challenge

alex do you have contact with the gaurdian journalist? he may like to respond

peter

*********
1. "Absolutely on track" at Phorm's end - reflecting the public 'heat', and understandably, ISPs are taking additional time to make sure they don't screw up - re: security and legality issues.
2. BT expected to launch "probably" within a week... or a few days thereafter.
3. Feeling pretty good on the recent PR trends in favour of Phorm - a positive editorial in last week's Economist, and earlier in the FT, plus a supportive speech in the House of Lords, plus recent supportive conversations with the Information Commissioner. And, a reduction in frequency of anti-Phorm blogging activity.
4. Kent expects the vocal minority to continue to become less and less vocal, and even more so once full service is launched.
5. As we assumed/understood, BT will launch first, with a press release accompanying the first 'interstitial notice' - i.e. the screen that pops up telling you that the system is on, and giving the option to opt out. Full roll-out across its customer base will be in a matter of days or weeks, but not longer. Virgin Media and TalkTalk are in full pre-launch preparation mode.
6. Once BT has launched, other announcements for other countries are expected. Country CEOs being recruited.
7. Publishers still totally on board - including the Guardian (whose journalist has been particularly vocal).

Conclusion: At last, positive newsflow does seem to be in the pipeline. We reiterate our Buy recommedation.
*******

[Tezcatlipoca]

Re. 7 - I thought the Guardian had pulled out?

[warescouse]

Originally Posted by Frank Rizzo

Googling for "Ertugrul" to find out about connections with the Times.

Nothing found yet but have found an interesting article from the NY Times in 1999. Apologies if this has already been posted amongst the 605 pages already.

Lifetimes of Memories Preserved on CD-ROM's by Kent

Once again the subscriber pays to give K*nt all his targeting data on a plate. Is there a word that describes a person who tries to find out every little thing about someone and uses that information for their own personal gain. Don't say, I can think of several!

[Florence]

Originally Posted by warescouse

Once again the subscriber pays to give K*nt all his targeting data on a plate. Is there a word that describes a person who tries to find out every little thing about someone and uses that information for their own personal gain. Don't say, I can think of several!

The con man at his best conning the less advantaged who think this is a legitiamate company when he is only pimping them for info.

[warescouse]

I posted about 100 copies of the Phorm Flyer to houses in my road today. Most are probably on VM but its a start!

As I always like to say when faced with a challenging problem.
Q. How do I eat an Elephant?
A. A bit at a time.

[jelv]

Can someone who is registered on iii find out when steadyasshegoes registered and if they have made any other posts on iii.

[mark777]

Originally Posted by bluecar1

just seen posted over on iii 19:28

phormukPR ??

Bluecar, there are a couple of phorm-positive posts at the top of that thread. Are they new users? I can't see as i'm not a member.

There does seem to be new members appearing across the forums, delivering the "good news".

It could well be that the red-braces brigade are back in town.

EDIT : Beat me to it jelv.

[bluecar1]

Originally Posted by jelv

Can someone who is registered on iii find out when steadyasshegoes registered and if they have made any other posts on iii.

member since 24/8/2000

he was the guy that posted the link to the charles stanley note that quoted outdated information but the CS note noted it was a risky stock as there was no comparable data to compare the projected profits against and they were unsure of phorms business model predictions


about 2/3 of his posts in the last year where on phorm

the other one "thebully" has also been registered since 2000 but only posted 2 comments on phorm, both quoting the same http://www.britishbulls.com/StockPag...Services&TYP=S which is just using basic averages to say buy or sell, not rumours etc


peter

[JackSon]

Dunno about when they first registered but they have been commenting on Phorm's section of iii.co.uk since it floated. I believe to be long term holder, strange though on the early comments, they seemed pleased to learn Phorm was what became of 121Media. Says a lot about a person one could say...

Shortened link (thinking of you, Popper )

[oblonsky]

I heard from someone at BT who I've been working with on a recent work contract that the trials could run "seemlessly" into full deployment. That is, Phorm may not be switched off at the trial exchanges, just that it will then be switched on accross the country. This may not be news to some people but certainly surprised me.

BT originally stated on their beta forums that when Webwise was fully deployed, users would have the option to fully opt-out of Phorm (presumably at the account level), however this functionality would not be available for the trial. The trial itself will invite users from an "interstitial" request for permission, which means Phorm has to intercept a browse request in order to get permission, indicating that everyone will be opted-in at an account level.

BT/Phorm also published details of the consent gathering exercise which showed cookies being dropped to indicate opt-out.

If the rumour at the start of my post is correct, has BT given up plans to offer an account-level opt-out?

Or will they offer it, but just not by default, meaning there are three levels of Phorming:
1.) Phormed
2.) Opted-out by cookie
3.) Account-level opt-out

So technically there will actually be 4 states any user can be in:
A.) Phormed, phorm UUID cookie present
B.) Opted-out by cookie
C.) Unknown (no cookies present)
D.) Account-level opt-out

I have it on very good authority that on the absense of any cookies on your machine, and the absense of an account-level opt-out, users will ALWAYS be presented with Phorm's interstitial request for consent. That is, the default user state will be C.).

This could seriously break a whole range of application which use HTTP to do something other than browsing, yet use IE as a browser identifier

It will also mean all users on your connection who regularly clear their cookies will be nagged to rejoin Phorm each time, and I fail to see how this will satisfy the ICO demand for informed consent and opt-in. However I hear from a little birdy that BT/Phorm's interpretation of "opt-in" is that the check-box on the webwise intersitital screen will not be checked by default!!!

Rumour: unconfirmed but I feel that any hope I had that BT would roll this out as a true opt-in system have been dashed.

Again, this is unconfirmed rumour but I heard also that Google's upcoming suite of broadband diagnostics tools was done with the likes of Phorm and NebuAd in mind. I really really hope that this is true.

The above post is personal opinion only, reporting my experiences and conversations with colleagues. If BT/Phorm feel that any of the above is untrue, then alert me and I will correct it. Email privacy.watch {at} gmail {dot} com and mark the email subject FAO Oblonsky.

[bluecar1]

iii only says

Show up to 25 trades from the last 8 hours

Latest trades

Time Price Bid Ask Volume Block Price B/S Type
10:36:46 1068p 1000p 1075p 5,000 £53,400 BUY O
10:36:32 1060p 1000p 1075p 5,000 £53,000 BUY O
10:04:31 1070p 1000p 1075p 200 £2,140 BUY O
09:59:20 1070p 1000p 1075p 400 £4,280 BUY O
09:53:36 1070p 1000p 1075p 1,000 £10,700 BUY O
09:49:39 1070p 1000p 1075p 500 £5,350 BUY O
09:38:36 1070p 1000p 1075p 1,000 £10,700 BUY O

not the first time there has been discrepencies between sites

but volumes etc are correct but don't match with data above

Today's summary Bid 1000p
Ask 1075p
High 1075p
Low 1040p
Open 1012.5p
Previous close 1000p
Settle price 1055p
Change +55p (+5.50%)
Volume 36,695