EBlog

Invading your privacy… or just serving you up with more relevant content?

October 31, 2007 | Posted by: Neil

As we wind down the day and prepare to pump up the neighborhood kids with candy, a series of very important meetings is taking place right here in our nation's capitol. The FTC is meeting to discuss internet privacy policy, which has the potential to drastically impact internet marketing as we know it.

There is talk of creating a do-not-track list which would essentially allow users to opt out of being tracked by Ad placement tools such as DoubleClick, or even analytics programs like Google Analytics and Omniture. Privacy groups will claim even nameless tracking violates our rights, while we ever scheming marketing types claim the tracking allows us to present visitors with more relevant content. The issue begs the question; are we invading the privacy of our visitors by tracking their net usage, even if we do so without ever knowing their identity? Personally, I think there is a delicate balance yet to be found, but I am left pondering the following:

- Does one site have the right to track my usage on other sites?

-How will marketing on the web change if we loose the ability to track our customer movements?

Either way, the lines are being drawn, and there is some big names on opposite sides of the issues. (AOL leading the charge for opt out lists, while Google has privacy groups concerned with the purchase of DoubleClick)