'Do Not Track' Registry Proposed for Web Use

[cal04]

Online Behavior Used to Tailor Ads
By Catherine Rampell

Privacy, consumer and technology groups yesterday proposed the creation of a Do Not Track list similar to the Do Not Call phone list, allowing people to prevent companies from tracking which Web sites they visit.

This proposal comes as large Internet companies are looking to increase the tracking of users' online behavior to tailor ads to their interests. Nine groups, including the Center for Democracy and Technology, the Consumer Federation of America and the World Privacy Forum, submitted the proposal to the Federal Trade Commission ahead of a two-day conference on behavioral advertising.

The Do Not Track list is modeled after the popular Do Not Call registry maintained by the FTC. Since 2003, telemarketers have been barred from calling numbers submitted to the list, which has about 145 million numbers.

"Consumers obviously know the Do Not Call list and have reacted well to it," said Mark Cooper, director of research at the Consumer Federation of America. "As an analogy it helps socialize an important concern and idea."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/31/AR2007103101000.html?hpid=topnews

[silverweb]

1. We already have a way to do that.

Just clear cookies, temporary internet files, and history frequently.

I keep the shortcut on my computer desktop to do just that -- and I do it at least twice a day, sometimes more often. I also run AdAware a couple of times a week.

Also, use Scroogle for searches more often than Google -- or at least for searches that you would prefer not be saved in Google's endless recorded memory.

On Edit: Do you really trust any web company to NOT track you just because they say they won't? Really?

[tkmorris]

2. Trust? No, but.....

If they install tracking cookies they will get exposed fast. I don't know if the proposal carried any penalties for violators or not (didn't read it) but finding out who is violating it would be a piece of cake. No trust needed.

[silverweb]

4. I think it would be a boondoggle.

I'd much rather see the money spent on something more appropriate and verifiable...

...like freight container inspections at our ports, for example. }(

[Redstone]

3. Me too, but it would be nice for people to be able to do it more easily. Though I agree

with you that trusting an Internet company to keep its word would be a shaky proposition at best.

Redstone

[silverweb]

5. I like having the control.

There's really nothing at all difficult about doing it oneself. Trust is also a huge issue... sadly, something I have very little of anymore.