Have you ever had the feeling your computer is watching you? And that rather than being your technological ‘friend’ it behaves more like a slick second-hand car salesman?
You fancied flying to Paris so you checked out airfares... and before you knew it, your Facebook page was plastered with advertisements for hotels on La Rive Gauche. Your daughter bought a record by One Direction. Now, the family computer is bombarded with ads for boy band concerts.
So why does this happen - and, more importantly, how can we stop it?
It is all because of something on your computer called a ‘cookie’. The origins of their name are unclear, but cookies are vital to the running of the internet. When you visit a website, that site places a unique cookie on your computer so it recognises you when you come back. It allows the website to remember your login details and other pieces of information to save you entering them again and again.
These devices - known as ‘first party cookies’ because they involve an exchange of information only between you and the site — make shopping on the internet possible. If you shop for groceries over the internet, for example, cookies allow you to update your shopping trolley day after day, returning as you remember to add new products before moving to the virtual checkout at the end of the week.
And cookies can remember your credit card details to save you having to enter them over and over again. So far, so good.
Problems arise when advertisers get involved. You may think all the websites you visit as you use the net are free, but they aren’t. In return for using them you automatically part with slices of information about yourself that can be used to send advertisements to the pages you look at as you surf.
This happens because of ‘third party’ or ‘tracking’ cookies. These are placed on your computer by companies who profit from finding out what interests you or what — from your searches — you are looking to buy. These companies — they could be household names like Google or others you have probably never heard of, such as Math Tag or Criteo — use this information to send targeted ‘behavioural’ advertisements to you. They rely on vast networks of retailers who allow them to send their cookies to you each time you visit their websites.
These information-gatherers argue that the data they collect about you is anonymous and they don’t actually care who you are — only that they are sending you adverts they think you need.
In the UK, spending on internet advertising is expected to top £5 billion (Dh27.8 billion) this year. The problem for the industry is that if everyone blocked tracking cookies, manufacturers would stop spending on ads because they could not be directed at the people they are targeting. In turn, websites wouldn’t make money from advertising and all that ‘free’ stuff would suddenly disappear.
Some argue the internet itself would die from a lack of advertising income. “If you accept that advertising funds the internet — and we find that consumers do understand that — then you have to realise you are going to get ads as you browse the web,” says Nick Stringer, director of regulatory affairs at the Internet Advertising Bureau (IAB), which represents 800 companies working in digital marketing.
“Our argument is that you might as well get advertisements for products and services that you are actually interested in.”
— Daily Mail