Jim

Firstly, in the light of Virgin Media's statement about Phorm on its website, I believe it unlikely that VM has done anything new.

Much of the news industry is struggling with the Internet business model where the business focus now hinges entirely around advertising dollars after most publications have given up the print subscription/provide more content model.

It is now sometimes difficult to avoid being profiled by a website through the legitimate use of cookies. In particular, the news industry is becoming better at this "all of a sudden" and provide article links which, since based only on what you most look out for the most. Since the news publisher is able to do this, it knows your interests and matches this with the adds served on its pages. For example I am noticing some horrible sketch like ads for tacky products appearing on very respectable web sites. These ads ruin otherwise elegant web pages and must be a major de-motivator for some truly talented web designers.

To achieve profiling to the extent that becomes necessary for these dratted litter like ads to be effective, the news industry is adopting the following techniques.

1. News is highly categorized.

In addition to broad categories such as "Money" "Art" "Investing" etc., further categorization is possible from the URL names accessed. If you can look at your cookie list for news websites you will likely see a cookie for each category.

2. Your use of cookies.

If you turn off cookies in your browser most news sites will not provide you with content

3. Accepting cookies only from the web site visited

Some browsers now offer this preference and if available to you go for it since it will save you much hassle and should not restrict your content in most instances of use. This will typically block tracking cookies from advertising sites linked to on the pages accessed.

4. Something new the news sites are doing.

The news sites are placing the tracking cookies from their domains for the advertising sites thereby bypassing any user blocking of accepting cookies from visited sites.

If you look at your cookie list for some news sites, you may find the categorization cookies followed by a whole load of tracking cookies placed by the each particular news site.

For example

http://www.anewswebsite.com RapTracker

5. Good cookies and bad cookies.

If you delete all cookies, you have deleted the good with the bad and you will also have to re-input your registration details again for sites requiring this.

6. Persistence of bad cookies.

If you delete tracking cookies placed by the original website you visit and the page is open, there's a good chance that the cookies will be re-set when you close the page. In any event the tracking cookies will appear the next time you visit the page.

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The above might be the reason for your recent woes.

I am curious about your e-mail problems.

Are you using web mail? If so give a try to a client based mail system such as Outlook Express. If you are using web mail, the web mail pages may be causing your unwanted pop ups. If you get browser based pop-ups when using a client based mail system and do not open the html e-mails in a browser, your system might have picked up something nasty. If your pop ups are happening without the browser being open, you have caught something very nasty and perhaps terminal.

About the use of free software
________________________

If you are using free software, beware! Ask yourself why it is free. Do some research before installing the software. Much free software, particularly system tuning, clean up and blocking software "phones home". Many will place undesirable executable code on your system.

In my experience, it is better not to use free software at all.


Good luck.

I see no problem with the adverts I see when visiting The Times website being based on which pages I visit on their website. But why should the ads I see on The Times website be based on which pages I read on thinkbroadband, Amazon, Curry's, BBC etc. That is private information between myself and the websites I chose to visit.

Also as an owner of a website you visit, why should Phorm be able to look at the information I am providing to you? Are they going to pay me for providing them with information about your interests?

Thats a trojan:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7389529.stm

This is a trojan and its not even related with browsers but with the use of P2P. Read the article here: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7389529.stm

Only with McAfee users alone almost 500,000 alone have been infected and they say they didnt see such an atack for the past 3 years.

For adverts to be based on your browsing elsewhere The Times in your example would have had to have signed up to OIX i.e. the ad interchange part of Phorm

As others mentioned this looks more like a Trojan.

Phorm should only provide its adverts on sites signed up to display them, not on every site you visit

I realise that!

Are you suggesting that if that is the case it means it's OK for Phorm to break the law? (Informed consent has to be given by both parties to make it legal).

I have also noticed some browsing profiles used on news sites which are not immediately attributable to pages I might have opened on that news website. The Times is an example, Reuters another.

Could this be an analysis of where you have LAST been before you visit the suspect web site? I am still trying to figure this out. I think that I might develop a temporary interest in caring for babies before visiting any Times or Reuters pages to establish if I am served with "Relevant Links" and ads for baby care products.

Any insights?

Thanks.

PS.

I have seen surprised similar comments from users of MySpace. Any experiences?

Or, could it be that some underhand personal data exchange is taking place between ad. tracking organizations and participating websites?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Referer

For example Wikipedia if you click that link will know you came from this site, and even what post, and can easily be used to help serve relevant adverts