Virgin Media Phorm Webwise Adverts [Updated: See Post No. 1, 77, 102 & 797]

[popper]

Originally Posted by Jimllfixit

This is going to be a really simple questions to answer.

How would I know if my surfing experience was being looked at right now.

What are the Tell Tale Traces that someone has implemented PHORM on any network not just Virgin Medias.

Is there a tool? A device or some simple command that tells me somone is not feeding me the pages as I want them but as they want me to see them?

I sat down this morning and just picked up on some string of some Google update in an e-mail. I havent stopped surfing all day looking in to this PHORM thing. I'm trying to be objective, I've contacted Virgin Media support who have told me it's not running but when it does start (or to be fair they said if it does start) I will be given the option to opt out. Having looked at as much detail as I can I'm struggling to see technically how I can opt out.

I've been in Telecomms and ISP business for 19 years now and while I fully understand the very real issues of trying to derive revenues from a market that is slashing it's own throat on price, while trying to build solid performance networks and pay those gents at BT huge Central charges. I never thought I'd see us hawking through the deritas of our customers surfings looking for a few spare pennies.

your, and indeed everyones very first thing to do, is send a registered post letter Data Protection Act Notice to the companies removing any and all rights you may have given them unknowingly for the purposes of direct marketing in any T&C contract.

see the link below to a search for your companies registered data controllers address to send it to, and make sure you head the letter "THIS IS A Data Protection Act Notice" to avoid any confusion on their part .

http://www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/acts1998...en_3#pt2-l1g11
"11 Right to prevent processing for purposes of direct marketing

(1) An individual is entitled at any time by notice in writing to a data controller to require the data controller at the end of such period as is reasonable in the circumstances to cease, or not to begin, processing for the purposes of direct marketing personal data in respect of which he is the data subject.

(2) If the court is satisfied, on the application of any person who has given a notice under subsection (1), that the data controller has failed to comply with the notice, the court may order him to take such steps for complying with the notice as the court thinks fit.

(3) In this section “direct marketing” means the communication (by whatever means) of any advertising or marketing material which is directed to particular individuals.
"

then also send another registered post letter Data Protection Act Notice removing any and all rights to Collect, Process,store, or Export outside the company, your personal data ,except for the specific purposes of supplying and billing for the contracted services.

---------- Post added at 04:15 ---------- Previous post was at 03:45 ----------

“data subject” means an individual who is the subject of personal data;

“personal data” means data which relate to a living individual who can be identified—
(a)
from those data, or

(b)
from those data and other information which is in the possession of, or is likely to come into the possession of, the data controller,

and includes any expression of opinion about the individual and any indication of the intentions of the data controller or any other person in respect of the individual;

“processing”, in relation to information or data, means obtaining, recording or holding the information or data or carrying out any operation or set of operations on the information or data, including—
(a)
organisation, adaptation or alteration of the information or data,

(b)
retrieval, consultation or use of the information or data,

(c)
disclosure of the information or data by transmission, dissemination or otherwise making available, or

(d)
alignment, combination, blocking, erasure or destruction of the information or data;

[Anonymouse]

Originally Posted by Tharrick

OK, I can understand being angry about the 'too dirty' comments, but I thoroughly agree with stopping people and reminding them to put some sensible clothes on while riding two-wheelers.

I did PM the poster just now, not wanting to go OT, but what the hell...it is sensible to wear leathers - I have a biker's jacket myself even though I currently ride a pushbike, and the previous one (now honourably retired after 12 years of faithful service despite all kinds of abuse, including my accident) saved me from some degree of scraping injury (not the cracked ribs, unfortunately - OOOHHH!!!) - but it's not a legal requirement...though you have a very good point in that it probably should be. Nor is it illegal to have a scooter/bike/car/tank/whatever in need of cleaning unless the registration plates and/or L-plates are partly or completely obscured.

I'd prefer it if they had the power to stop cyclists who don't wear helmets or use lights. The former isn't compulsory, but it should be.

Right. Back on-topic, everyone!

[popper]

OMG, remember that Phorm DID NOT register with the ICO Data Protection Register until 30 January 2008

search on "Phorm" here url: http://www.ico.gov.uk/ESDWebPages/Search.asp?EC=1

http://www.pcpro.co.uk/blogs/2008/06...t-excuse-ever/
"BT's Phorm trial - the worst excuse ever
June 9th, 2008 Barry Collins
' "
BT did not discuss these trials with the ICO as they were technical in nature," the ICO claims in a statement sent to PC Pro. '
..."

"....Information Commissioner, which is presumably waiting for Mrs Miggins from the corner shop to lose her paper-round book before clamping down with the full force of our stringent data laws?"

http://www.pcpro.co.uk/news/204711/b...missioner.html
"
...
Speaking to PC Pro this morning, Phorm spokesman Alex Laity said the company was always confident the service was lawful. "We are confident that we are fully compliant with all relevant laws," he said. "We did go to the ICO before launch, we did go to the Home Office before launch, we did do due diligence to make sure what we did is fully compliant with the law."

"

---------- Post added at 08:36 ---------- Previous post was at 08:00 ----------

Originally Posted by Frank Rizzo

I wrote to the ICO on Friday. I do not know if today's announcement is in response to my letter or they made the announcement before 'reading' my letter.

The letter was a follow up to the letter they wrote to me on the 30th May. This is the letter where they said



I asked them if they had seen the report on the 2006 trials.
I pointed out to them the folly of BT saying they could not contact me.

I asked them to confirm that they had seen the "legal advice" which BT said they had sought.

I asked them about the 'small scale' quote and asked them to confirm how big a scale the trials would have had to have been in order for them to take action.

Along with a few other questions I stated this:

"May I inform you that I am in full conversation with John Penrose MP and that I am asking EU Commissioner Viviane Reding to investigate this matter, as I believe the ICO is failing in it’s duty to protect personal information.

If I do not receive a satisfactory response I will be forced to not only ask the EU Commission to intervene but also initiate a complaint with the Parliamentary Ombudsman."

The EU and the Parliamentary Ombudsman it is then.

http://news.zdnet.co.uk/security/0,1...20,00.htm?r=16
"The ICO seeks to resolve issues informally," said an ICO spokesperson. "We didn't have the internal [leaked] document, but Phorm and BT did present us with information [after the trial]. We've worked with BT and Phorm and we are not going to take any punitive action at this stage."

"

what exactly this "Phorm and BT did present us with information" is though, is still a mistery, perhaps it was a link to this information ?

http://www.amazon.com/AdWords-Dummie.../dp/0470152524

http://www.amazon.com/review/product...owViewpoints=1
"By John Forman "Author -The Essentials of Trading" (Boston, MA USA) - See all my reviews
I think a slightly better title for this book would be "Online Marketing with AdWords for Dummies". I say that because the book goes beyond just AdWords to talk about the peripheral systems involved. Personally, I was after purely AdWords information, so the extra stuff was just something to be ignored and bypassed.

That added material aside, if you want a VERY thorough walk through AdWords, this book will serve your needs quite well. It is dense, full of very useful information and techniques. The author also includes a great deal of supporting info and tools on a support website, which helps to keep things up-to-date.

All in all, a fantastic investment.
....
"

[AlexanderHanff]

Here is something you might all be interested in:

https://nodpi.org/?p=20

Alexander Hanff

[Dephormation]

If Phorm spokesman Alex Laity said "we did go to the Home Office before launch" then he could not have been talking about the trials in 2006/7 because Simon Watkin at the Home Office said the following to me in an FoI response;

- Whether the Home Office were made aware of the secret trials conducted by Phorm in 2006/7

It wasn’t.

- Whether the Home Office authorised secret trials conducted by Phorm in 2006/7

The Home Office was not aware of the trials/tests.

- When you first started advising BT and Phorm (and other ISPs)

Asked for a view we gave that view to all parties who asked for it on or after 4 February 2008.

Phorm did not, repeat DID NOT, advise the Home Office before trialling the software in 2006/7. I'm still hopeful we might get more information about the Home Office involvement prior to the public announcement on February 14 2008.

Pete

[BetBlowWhistler]

Originally Posted by AlexanderHanff

Here is something you might all be interested in:

https://nodpi.org/?p=20

Alexander Hanff

I see that this was written back in October 2007.

The benefits of WBMC are:
• Provides a platform for BT Wholesale to provide additional functionality at the connection point such as Deep Packet Inspection (DPI) and content hosting, security (content blocking / virus filtering and harmful application screening) and voice gateways.

Whilst I'm all for giving BT enough rope to hang themselves with, this might not be related to Phorm. I'd be very interested to hear Emma's response to this development. It certainly isn't a blatant advert for ad-serving though is it?

For instance, I'm aware that there have been traffic-shaping units within the BT network for years, but the one I know about was configured for pass-through during my tenure! (20k's worth of kit acting as a transparent bridge )

[Tarquin L-Smythe]

"OMG, remember that Phorm DID NOT register with the ICO Data Protection Register until 30 January 2008"

And the ICO just forgot to mention in all their nice little pre-launch meetings "Oh by the way tou should register with us " .If I got it right is the ICO just a way of paying your mates for not doing a job.And for cats to have any thing done with claws they had to have some first ,clearly not in this case.

[AlexanderHanff]

Originally Posted by BetBlowWhistler

I see that this was written back in October 2007.



Whilst I'm all for giving BT enough rope to hang themselves with, this might not be related to Phorm. I'd be very interested to hear Emma's response to this development. It certainly isn't a blatant advert for ad-serving though is it?

For instance, I'm aware that there have been traffic-shaping units within the BT network for years, but the one I know about was configured for pass-through during my tenure! (20k's worth of kit acting as a transparent bridge )

Well I have made it very clear in the article that DPI can be used for lots of things. The point is, because of that there needs to be transparency, not only from BT (whom I have contacted for further information) but also from the ISPs using WBMC.

ISPs reselling BT Wholesale products should be completely transparent and make sure they have information on 3rd party services, particularly how DPI is being used, available on their web sites.

Since ICO and the Home Office appear to be refusing to offer any form of oversight on these issues, it is up to us to do it instead.

Alexander Hanff

---------- Post added at 09:44 ---------- Previous post was at 09:21 ----------

I will also be sending an official complaint to the ISPA this week as I feel BT (a member) have broken section 2.21 and 2.4 of the ISPA Code of Conduct (at the very least) with their trials in 2006/2007.

I will post a letter template on NoDPI once I have finished it and I would recommend as many people as possible send a complaint to the ISPA (either with my template or their own) at the earliest opportunity.

Alexander Hanff

[Rchivist]

Originally Posted by popper

OMG, remember that Phorm DID NOT register with the ICO Data Protection Register until 30 January 2008

search on "Phorm" here url: http://www.ico.gov.uk/ESDWebPages/Search.asp?EC=1

http://www.pcpro.co.uk/blogs/2008/06...t-excuse-ever/
"BT's Phorm trial - the worst excuse ever
June 9th, 2008 Barry Collins
' "
BT did not discuss these trials with the ICO as they were technical in nature," the ICO claims in a statement sent to PC Pro. '

I've had this dream - in it I am thinking of running a technical trial of various ways available to me of sniffing and hacking into my neighbours' wireless routers, I would be looking for the most transparent technical model for this, so that I could theoretically explore the possibility of profiling my neighbours's browsing and possibly their bank and shopping details. I've been wondering about the possibility of there being money to be made, collecting their personal data as I understand it can be sold for a decent price to some shady outfits in Moscow.

I was going to chat to the Home Office but have decided against it. This trial is purely technical in nature and of course I won't be telling my neighbours although I monitor the chat over cocktails to see if they have spotted any problems with their internet connection. (Helps me decide about how compliant the various technical methods are)

I'm wondering about setting up some Core Success Criteria to measure things like "transparency" (whether the neighbours noticed) and "integrity" (did it crash their network or mine). My business partner, Oleg, newly arrived from Moscow, tells me that if I wanted, he could set up the other end of the business, for marketing the data. He's here under an assumed name, but seems to have the skills for that sort of thing.

Blow me down with a feather - the ICO have been in touch and told me it's illegal and I'm in for 42 days detention without charge, and interrogation after rendition to another country. Do you think I could claim that as it was merely a technical trial, the ICO shouldn't "push it"? Apparently they caught me and Oleg chatting on the CCTV covering our back garden.

Do you think the ICO will be lenient with me? After all it was only a technical trial.

Remember - just a dream. I've woken up, stepped out of the shower now, and back into the REAL world where these things don't and can't happen because of the wonderful protection offered to ordinary multinational corporations by our marvellous ICO.

[Frank Rizzo]

Alex. I made a complaint to the ISPA asking them to suspend BT whilst investigations were taking place.

I received the typed letter equivalent of a raised middle finger.

The ISPA also advised that I should complain to OTELO instead. I see that as buck passing.

[AlexanderHanff]

Originally Posted by Frank Rizzo

Alex. I made a complaint to the ISPA asking them to suspend BT whilst investigations were taking place.

I received the typed letter equivalent of a raised middle finger.

The ISPA also advised that I should complain to OTELO instead. I see that as buck passing.

If they suddenly get 1000+ letters of complaint to deal with, they may not take the matter so lightly. Letter writing campaigns en masse can be very effective as they take real time and money to deal with (as opposed to emails which can be blocked by filters in minutes). It would take a significant amount of time to deal with a mass influx of letters numbering in the thousands which means a significant amount of money. Often it is easier to get action out of an organisation when administrative costs start to hit their bottom line.

Furthermore, we have good solid evidence of the 2006 trials now, so I intend to go through the entire report and indicate which sections of the Code of Practise they are in breach of and comprehensive reference/citation of relevant laws. It is going to be a very long letter.

Alexander Hanff

[jelv]

I've been using Google Alerts to monitor postings in any groups containing "webwise" or "phorm". What is very pleasing to see is that they are cropping up in more and more different groups - many to do with security. If Phorm's PR team were aiming to contain and manage "information" in the hope that in a few weeks the storm will have died down they have to date failed dismally!

[SelfProtection]

A question keeps making my head spin, maybe someone can clarify how BT & others may manage it.

BT are trying to produce a non cookie option as the cookie clearly leaks & could easily be proved to breach DPA requirements.

In the absence of Cookies, which I believe were also being used to prevent infinite loops on the infrastructure. How would this Infrastructure properly detect infinite loops, specifically in the case of a Firewall or Router blocking the Webwise System. (hosts file would resolve to 127.0.0.1 & not go through the system?).

If this cannot be done reliably then a 100% CPU load could easily be reached with resulting Power & Load Balancing problems.

I specifically ask this because there have been spurious reports on Forums about users having to lift their Software Firewall in order to connect to http port 80 on both the BT & NTL Service, even though they can still receive e-mail etc, over the last 4-6 weeks.
This seems to intermittent & annoying for some users?

[jelv]

I think I can see where you are going here:

One of the stated objectives in the leaked document was that the system should be transparent to the user. BT have therefore, having re-engineered the system, started the trials without giving the promised 24 hours notice to see if they have succeeded in making it transparent.

[mark777]

Originally Posted by jelv

I think I can see where you are going here:

One of the stated objectives in the leaked document was that the system should be transparent to the user. BT have therefore, having re-engineered the system, started the trials without giving the promised 24 hours notice to see if they have succeeded in making it transparent.

Conducting 'technical' trials to test the infrastructure before starting the 'user' trials (for which they will give 24hrs notice)?

IMO that's exactly the sort of stunt they would pull.

A small leak about this sort of thing could have fueled the mini-recovery in the share price we saw about a month ago.

BTW, the shares seem to be moving in the opposite direction to which I would have expected, given yesterday's announcement of the strategic alliance with the ICO. Good volumes as well.

Perhaps money bods get nervous when big companies feel the need to make legal threats to try to gag critics.

EDIT : A compromise Alex