Behavioural advertising ‘more vanilla than people think' says IAB

UK-- The Internet Advertising Bureau's head of regulatory affairs says fears over behavioural targeting are exaggerated and that the practices are “much more vanilla than people think”.

Nick Stringer told Research that the balance between protecting people's privacy and providing relevant content is “a hugely important question”, but that there is a widespread lack of understanding of how different behavioural advertising techniques work.

The IAB published a set of good-practice principles for behavioural advertising in March, which firms have until September to comply with, and is currently developing procedures for enforcement.

In the mean time, the debate over the privacy implications of ad targeting technology seems to be getting more acrimonious. Tim Berners-Lee, the inventor of the World Wide Web, recently joined privacy campaigners and lawmakers in voicing concerns about what he called “net snooping” technology, while the European Commission has launched legal proceedings against the UK over its implementation of privacy rules, after it was found that BT carried out secret trials of Phorm's ad targeting software in 2006 and 2007.

Stringer believes behavioural advertising should really create a win-win situation. “From an advertiser's point of view they can reach consumers who are more likely to be interested in their products and services than not,” he told Research. “From a consumer point of view it means more advertising that's useful and less that's not useful.”

The IAB's principles, he said, should be seen as a starting point in a process of building trust.

“We did a survey and half of the people we asked said they would prefer to receive advertising that was more relevant to what they were interested in, while only about 9% wouldn't,” said Stringer. “But when we asked people what behavioural targeting or advertising is, only about half understood.”

He underlines that ‘behavioural advertising' described a range of activities, including tracking activity on a company's own websites (as is carried out by the likes of Google and Yahoo) as well as third-party tracking of activity across a range of sites (as is carried out by specialists like Phorm).

It's important for the public to understand the nature of online tracking and its purpose, he argues.

“I don't like the word profiling,” said Stringer. “I think it's slightly misleading. What companies are doing is building interest-based segments. It's not capturing data on me, Nick Stringer, it's capturing data on the fact I like Liverpool Football Club or Britney Spears. The web-browsing data collected is anonymous, and you go into a pot, so to speak, with thousands of others who like Liverpool Football Club so that when I go back online later in the day I might get served a football ad. The point is that the advertiser doesn't need to know who the person is. The advertiser cares about what the person is interested in. It isn't something scary. It's much more vanilla than people think.

Despite the controversy, Stringer sees a bright future for behavioural advertising. “It seems logical that it's going to grow because the win-wins seem to be obvious for the consumer, the content provider, and the advertiser. But only if there is trust and the practices are followed.”

But with major web publishers including Amazon and Wikimedia opting out of being scanned by Phorm, and a website set up by the company to hit back at “smears” from privacy groups prompting legal threats from one campaigner, it seems companies engaging in behavioural tracking face an uphill struggle in winning that trust.

• Online youth charity YouthNet announced yesterday that it was opting out of being tracked by Phorm, claiming that “anonymity and confidentiality” are crucial to its work in talking to young people about difficult issues.

Author: Robert Bain

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IAB leads ‘good practice' initiative for behavioural advertising