Originally published on Benscomputer.no-ip.org 5 Mar 2008
The tech news pages are alive
with the news that BT, Virgin Media and Talk Talk are planning to sell
its customers browsing information to a company named Phorm.
BT claims that the new 'service' Webwise is intended to improve
the browsing safety of its users. It includes a list of Phishing sites,
and warns users when they attempt to connect to one of the listed sites.
Newsflash for you guys: FIREFOX ALREADY HAS THIS FUNCTIONALITY. Its
nothing new, and of no real benefit if you already have a browser that
does this. It's also not a lot of use if you are wary of emails from
institutions that ask for personal details.
Unfortunately WebWise
also sends your browsing history (and a copy of everything you
send/download on unsecured connections) to Phorms servers where they
will profile it and effectively mangle some of the pages you
download to include adverts that they believe may interest you.
This
mangling will only happen on pages that run adverts from Phorm, not
every site will be effected.