Title: Eprivacy Issues and
1 Eprivacy Issues and Their Potential Effect on
Online Data Collection
Anna Long Founder and Principal Analyst Web
AnalyticaSM
2Agenda
- ePrivacy Whats the Problem?
- Three Attempts to Address ePrivacy Issues
- EU ePrivacy Directive
- W3C Tracking Protection Working Group
- W3C Customer Experience Digital Data Community
Group
1 - 2
3Online Privacy Whats the Problem?
- The landscape
- The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Time
Magazine, and other news organizations have
written articles raising concerns about abuse of
privacy online. - The Privacy Rights Clearinghouse, Consumer
Watchdog, Consumer Action, and the Center for
Digital Democracy have voice concerns about
online privacy. - Politicians and regulators in the US and other
regions have conducted studies, held hearings,
and introduced legislation attempting to address
online privacy violations.
4Technologys Impact on Privacy
Concerns about technologys impact on privacy
pre-date the commercialization of the World Wide
Web.
4
5Technologys Impact on Privacy
A new protocol being developed by the Internet
Engineering Task Force (IETF) has raised privacy
concerns. Internet Protocol Version 6 (IPv6) is
the "next generation" protocol designed by the
IETF to replace the current version Internet
Protocol (IPv4)... The new addressing
structure, however, may mean that every packet
can be traced back to each user's unique network
interface card ID That information... forms the
basis of the privacy concerns raised by some
observers of the IETF process.
Concerns about the Internets effect on privacy
go back to the last century.
5
6Online Privacy Is This The Problem?
6
7Whats to Be Done about ePrivacy Issues?
- Three major initiatives are underway
- European Unions ePrivacy Directive applies
regulation to cookie storage - World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) Tracking
Protection Working Group developing standards to
put tracking control in the hands of individual
website users - W3C Customer Experience Digital Data Community
Group creating standards that put control in
the hands of website owners
7
8Europe Union ePrivacy Directive
- The European Commission has had an online privacy
directive (Directive 2002/058 on Privacy and
Electronic Communications) in place for over a
decade. - 2002 version required website owners to inform
visitors about cookie placement and offer a
method of refusing cookies (opt-out) - 2009 version requires website owners to gain
permission from visitors before storing any
cookies not essential to basic site operation
(opt-in) - The opt-in requirement of the 2009 revision
caused an uproar in the European online
community. Many feared it would severely disrupt
visitors website experiences and put European
online commerce at a severe competitive
disadvantage.
8
9EU ePrivacy Directive 2009 Revision
"Member States shall ensure that the storing of
information, or the gaining of access to
information already stored, in the terminal
equipment of a subscriber or user is only allowed
on condition that the subscriber or user
concerned has given his or her consent, having
been provided with clear and comprehensive
information, in accordance with Directive
95/46/EC, inter alia, about the purposes of the
processing.... From 2009 Revision of
Article 5(3) of Directive 2002/58/EC, emphasis
added
10European Union Legislative ActivityThe Cookie
Laws
- European Commission directed all EU members to
incorporate the amended ePrivacy Directive into
their national laws by 25 May 2011. - Many members did not meet that deadline and
still have not put regulation in place. - UK enacted regulations requiring opt-in checks
as of 26 May 2011 and immediately postponed
enforcement for a year. - When the UK regulation took effect, the UK
Information Commissioners Office (ICO) urged
quick action, but the law was quickly derided as
anti-competitive, confusing, and harmful.
Eventually, even the ICO took down its cookie
opt-in pop-up.
10
11BBC Food An Example of a Cookie Opt-In (Almost)
12David Naylor An Example of a Cookie Opt-In
(Parody)
13How the UK Cookie Law has Played Out One View
From http//blog.silktide.com/2013/01/the-stupid-c
ookie-law-is-dead-at-last/more-2942
14What the UK Cookie Law Has Achieved One Opinion
From http//blog.silktide.com/2013/01/the-stupid-c
ookie-law-is-dead-at-last/more-2942
15W3C Tracking Protection Working GroupBackground
- In Spring 2011, the World Wide Web Consortium
(W3C) created its Tracking Protection Working
Group to deliver standards for communicating and
conforming to website visitors privacy
preferences. - From the beginning, this was a high-profile group
with members from technical fields, governments,
and industry associations, but dominated by
privacy advocates and advertising industry
groups.
15
16W3C Tracking Protection Working GroupThe Twists
and Turns
- Between September 2011 and April 2014, the
groups work has included - Multiple drafts of two specifications
- Tracking preference expression (the Do Not Track
(DNT) flag) - Website compliance
- 9 face-to-face meetings in Europe and US
- 111 teleconferences
- 242 issues raised
- 447 actions assigned
- 5 co-chairs
- 2 charter extensions
16
17W3C Tracking Protection Working GroupWhere Does
The Project Stand?
- The latest
- Summer 2013 Digital Advertising Alliance
stand-off forced co-chairs to choose sides.
Result several resignations and group went on
hiatus. - W3C surveyed the remaining working group members
to determine how to proceed. Chose to proceed,
but losing members and shrinking scope. - One spec (tracking preference expression)
approaching release for public comment - Meanwhile, all major browsers as well as some
software operating systems and utilities are
offering the DNT flag as an option or a default.
Most websites are ignoring the flag.
17
18W3C Customer Experience Digital Data Community
GroupBackground
- This W3C Project was formed by the merger of two
standardization initiatives, one led by Google
and Qubit, the other by IBM - It is being driven primarily by technologists and
analysts - The Groups mission is to identify a standard
framework for analytics data, both for efficiency
and to enhance analytics capabilities - Because much of this data is of a sensitive or
private nature, privacy must be addressed along
with other standardization issues
18
19W3C Customer Experience Digital Data Community
GroupStandard Analytics Data Object (Current as
of Spec. 1)
19
20W3C Customer Experience Digital Data Community
GroupPermissions Mapping
Example of a mapping table
www.calc.com analytics www.adsRus.com
advertising www.audit.com financial www.oursi
te.com personalization
21W3C Customer Experience Digital Data Community
GroupArchitecture (Current Vision)
www.BigAds.com
Access Permissions Table
Data
Request
Request
www.calc.com analytics www.adsRus.com
advertising www.audit.com - financial
Access Control Layer
21
22W3C Customer Experience Digital Data Community
GroupBenefits
- In developing the specification with these
features, the Group is attempting to set up an
analytics data architecture that - Provides standardized data to be used by all
analytics products - Is flexible, extensible, and customizable for
regions, industries, and organizations - Offers the potential for more analytics
integration (such as web application
performance monitoring)
If you are interested in participating in this
effort as it moves to the next stage of
standardization, contact me.
23Anna LongFounder and Principal AnalystWeb
AnalyticaSM
- Email anna.m.long_at_webanalytica.net
- LinkedIn linkedin.com/in/annamlong
- Twitter _at_webbylytical
- Cary, NC
- Washington, DC
- 919 349-5725