[2461] in WWW Security List Archive
Re: cookies and privacy
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (William M. Heinrichs)
Thu Jul 18 15:45:36 1996
Date: Thu, 18 Jul 1996 10:28:38 -0700
From: billh@mammothcave.JPL.NASA.GOV (William M. Heinrichs)
To: www-security@ns2.rutgers.edu
Errors-To: owner-www-security@ns2.rutgers.edu
> I wonder if collecting marketing data isn't perceived so differently that
> the larger national media will pass on it. After all, they are in the
> marketing game themselves and dearly love to collect all kinds of things
> about their subscribers / viewers / readers / audience. They probably wish
> they could collect as much as doubleclick.
>
> Someone sneaking an email address from a browser is a specific act on a
> specific piece of personal information, and people react to that because
> it is clearly a privacy issue. doubleclick's information collection,
> though potentially far more complete, is not perceived the same way. If
> the media doesn't pick up on this, who will? Those that are Internet
> aware will get around it; the majority just won't know and may not care.
>
> Have I overlooked something? Somebody take a swipe at this and prove me
> wrong -- PLEASE! Yes, there are reasonable uses of cookies, but until I
> figure a way around doubleclick the readonly addtribute is still set on
> cookies.txt.
>
> -- Michael
>
>
The best way to control doubleclick is through exposure and loss of
revenue. Why not set your NS protocol preferences to notify you when
a cookie is being sent. If it is a doubleclick cookie, send mail to
webmaster@site.accessed and "CC" it to postmaster@doubleclick.com. Tell
them that you refused their cookie and why. It probably would not hurt
to CC some media as well. If a substantial number of people do this, the
message that "stealth data collection" is not acceptable will eventually
get out.
-Bill
