Phorm Dying Off In The UK, Heads Abroad To Survive
It looks like the privacy mob has spoken, because Phorm, the potentially revenue-generating but rather queasily invasive internet advertising technology, has been given a thumbs down by BT, Virgin Media and Carphone Warehouse. Phorm’s share price has dropped like a stone, 40% yesterday and continuing today.
After BT said it didn’t have plans to roll out the technology, Carphone Warehouse and Virgin dropped their plans too. BT cited its “commitment to developing next-generation broadband and television services”, and said it didn’t have the resources available to roll out Phorm too. So it’s not ruling it out altogether, but its a blow for Phorm, who are pouring money away without any sign of revenue being generated on a large scale, and who (now embarrassingly) announced that BT would be moving forward with the technology back in December. The FT reports that Phorm are now looking overseas for other ISPs to hop on board.
They must be wondering what went wrong. They made friends in high places, got Ofcom on board, and got shedloads of investment (with their latest £15m turning up less than a month ago). If Phorm does go down the tubes, it’ll be down to a few small but crucial errors – the testing of BT customers without their permission, their paranoid and ranting Stop Phoul Play site.
But they’ve also been hampered by the hazy general distrust from the public of anything that follows what you do online, even if it doesn’t store the information or identify you, as Phorm claim. Tim Berners-Lee was a high profile example of this lack of faith, saying: “To allow someone to snoop on your internet traffic is to allow them to put a television camera in your room, except it will tell them a whole lot more about you than the television camera”. This is quite an unfair comparison if Phorm’s technology works in the way they say it does – at no point can you be identified as you remain an anonymous number throughout the process.
But the ISPs and sites realise how much privacy means to their customers, and how toxic it would be to be thought of as untrustworthy spies – Amazon cut ties with Phorm after just one customer complaint. The resistance from the like of NoDPI and the Register has been pretty formidable too.
So it looks like a victory for the privacy campaigners, but for how long? BT still essentially have faith in targeted advertising – they didn’t postpone the rollout because of privacy issues. If Phorm manage to last long enough, they could be back, but it’s hard to shake the feeling that if it’s not them, it’ll be someone else in a few years time.
Posted by Ben Beaumont-Thomas in Sci-tech | July 7, 2009 11:10AM |
July 10th, 2009 at 10:59 am
Going into partnership with people who made their money infecting computers could only lead wholesale customer rebellion. Those who failed to see it coming should be fired. Supplying customer information to these people was repugnant to say the least. Illegal trials, illegal government participation, and the illegal and very public derailing of a regulators ruling and a police enquiry was never going to win the hearts and souls of any idiots customer base. I hope the European Commissioner’s enquiry into the criminals involved is both far reaching and very, very robust.
April 1st, 2010 at 3:57 pm
During the past few years I have researched a lot of stock that maybe suitable for investment. One of the eye-catching stocks has been Phorm and I have noted that a few self-interested parties seem to have been ranting on adversely about Phorm whilst indoctrinating others with their neurotic points of view and producing mass hysteria. Meanwhile the likes of Google, Facebook and other large internet conglomerates have continued to accumulate even larger amounts of personal information that could be accessible to all determined hackers. Maybe Google and others would love to see Phorm crash out of existence so they can get their claws into this lucrative market.
Phorm seems to have come up with a brilliant piece of conceptual software in Webwise Discover, which should not only save time and provide essential selective information but also protect users from spam and other dangerous rubbish circulating the internet. I cannot believe that so many people do not appear to have had the decency to study and comment on Webwise Discover and see the way it protects personal information. There are no apparent comments from anyone, including BT, TalkTalk, Virgin Media, etc., who has actually used the latest version of Webwise Discover and hence prove or disprove the effectiveness of the software. I have not had chance to use Webwise Discover, because it was unfortunately chased off beyond Europe and the UK, however I have studied the general concept which I must assume for now, is valid. If anyone has fully tested the latest version, then let us know the results. All Europe/ UK have done is to give the company an unproven bad name and reputation, whilst inferring dubious practice which has left it no option than to go somewhere where it is more appreciated.
Clearly, Brazil and hopefully South Korea have the foresight to realise the way forward with intelligent advertising.
Initially, Phorm made a few mistakes whilst developing a completely new internet behavioural advertising concept. They have taken on board the worries about privacy and seemed to have modified their software. It is up to individuals to take responsibility for their own actions. With Webwise Discover, Phorm seems to have a unique way of preventing personal data being retained, misused or transmitted to other unapproved sources.
I suggest you all get off the neurotic bandwagon and take note of the facts before continuing to blackguard this company.