Adam Broitman's List: BT031109

• Consumers(1) are more conscious of behavioral targeting than ever before, according to a recent survey conducted by TNS for TRUSTe
• consumer discomfort with behavioral advertising declined year over year (from 57 percent in 2008 to 51 percent in 2009),
• 72 percent of those surveyed said they found online advertising intrusive and annoying when the products and services being advertised were not relevant to their wants and needs.
• 48 percent saying they delete cookies on their computer at least once a week --
• an increase from 42 percent in 2008 -

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• Facebook's announcement comes as Google announced that it will show ads to people based on their habits. This behavioral targeting is designed to make ads more "interesting," according to Google.

• Contrary to the assumption of some in the industry, behavioral targeting as a term is no longer esoteric. In fact, according to the survey, 43.2% of respondents said they're familiar with the term, and 68.6% knew that their browsing information may be collected by a third party for advertising purposes. Over a third, 34.9%, felt their privacy has been invaded or violated in the last year due to information they provided on the Internet

• Tim Berners-Lee warned against tracking people online. "It is very important that when [we] click we click without a thought that a third party knows what we're clicking on,"
• Phorm's platform, which uses deep packet inspection technology, serves ads to people based on information about the sites they've visited gleaned through their ISPs.

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  We think we can make online advertising even more relevant and useful by using additional information about the websites people visit. Today we are launching "interest-based" advertising as a beta test on our partner sites and on YouTube. These ads will associate categories of interest — say sports, gardening, cars, pets — with your browser, based on the types of sites you visit and the pages you view. We may then use those interest categories to show you more relevant text and display ads.
• We believe there is real value to seeing ads about the things that interest you.