Webwise "Customer Choice Process"

[Dan Beale-Cocks]

Nicholas Bohm wrote:
>  Dan Beale-Cocks wrote:
> > David Hansen wrote:
> >> On 11 Apr 2008 at 11:03, Nicholas Bohm wrote:
> >>
> >>> If that's what Phorm would say, it would be rubbish; and it
> >>> would betray Phorm's failure to grasp that directing something
> >>> to an individual under a pseudonym is no different from
> >>> directing it to him by any other name.
> >>
> >> Agreed. To use an example we have used before, along time ago,
> >> Miss Cilla Black is the same as the two other names under which
> >> she goes. If someone was to call her by another "random" string
> >> that would not make her someone else.
> >
> > But Phorm would say they're not sending ads to Miss Cilla Black (or
> > ID12345), but to a set of people.
> >
> > I'm perhaps confused because I'm comparing to direct mail.  Posting
> > something to "the Occupier" is allowed, even if you target a set of
> > postcodes, or houses with red doors.
>
>  Can you indicate the basis for that last claim?

I agree with you about the red herring.  There are different laws for 
paper and electronic communication.  But, to answer your question - the 
MPS site talks about "codes of practice" and and ASA policy.  They say 
they cannot stop un-addressed mail, or mail sent to "The Occupier".  
Someone sending that mail will usually pay to send X copies to houses in 
postcode regions Y and Z - how else do they send it?

 > It seems a red
>  herring anyway, because Phorm use the pseudonymised identity of an
>  individual to decide what advert to show that individual.

I hope that it's seen that way, and that Phorm / OIX don't get away with 
"We serve ads for cars tothe group of  people who've been browsing 
websites about cars, not to an individual".

>  For some reason you snipped out the following sentence from what you
>  quote above:

Apologies. I'm getting to grips with the netiquette.

> > The fact that such an individual might be a member of a group is
> > clearly within the contemplation of 11(3), which chooses to use the
> > word "individuals" in the plural instead of relying on the rule of
> > interpretation that the singular includes the plural.
>
>  Can you suggest what Phorm would say in answer to that point?

I suspect that they would think "we better start reading these laws a 
bit more closely, and get some better lawyers working for us", but that 
they would say "We don't serve ads to 'Fred Blogs' as an individual, or 
his family as a group of individuals, but we do serve ads to 'people 
who've browsed pages containing references to Subaru cars'."