2. Behavior Tracking
Dhaval Patel

3. Objective Ad Network Behavior Tracking Privacy Issues Solutions
Browser Cookies
Flash Cookies
Web Beacons
Fingerprinting Devices
Privacy Issues
Solutions
Conclusions

4. Online Advertising
Plays a critically important role in the internet world
Major playing factor for profiting from the internet
Developed alongside the growth of the medium itself

5. Online Advertising

6. Web History
1993 GNN (Global Network Navigator) was the first commercial website to sell a clickable ad
1994 First internet banner, AT&T
1994 First commercial spam, a “Green Card Lottery”
1995 Advertiser like MC and Zima were paying GNN $110 to $11,000 per week for ad spots
1995 First Ad Server developed by FocaLink Media Services
1996 DoubleClick, online ad-related services providing agency, created a way to track banner ads and consumer behavior and help track the ROI
2008 Google acquired DoubleClick for US$3.1 Billion

7. What is behavior tracking?
Refers to the practice of tracking users across web sites in order to learn user interests and preferences
Benefits
Advertisers targets a more focused audience which increases the effectively
Consumer is “bothered” by more relevant and interesting ads

8. Factors of Behavior Tracking
Number of days since last visit
Speed of behavior
Number of products viewed during last visit
Number of pages viewed
Supplying personal information
Number of days since last purchase
Number of past purchases

9. Web Tracking Track user behavior as they move from site to site
types of tracking method:
Browser Cookies
Flash Cookies
Beacons
Apps
IP Address Tracking

10. Browser Cookies What is a cookie?
Information that a site saves to your computer using your web browser
Record your browsing activities
Pages and content you looked at
When you visited
What you searched
You clicked on an ad

11. Browser Cookies First Party vs Third Party Cookies First party cookies
Place by a site when you visit it
Make your experience on the web more efficient
For example:
Items in your shopping cart
Log-in name
Preference
Game scores
Sessions
Third party cookies
Place by someone other than the site you are on
Include an advertising network or a company that helps deliver the ads you see
Deliver ads tailored to your interests

12. Browser Cookies Transient vs. Persistent Cookies Transient Cookies
Jobs is to help “sessionize” your experience on a website
“set” when we visit the site, it disappears when we leave
Persistent Cookies
Set the first time we visit the website
It will remain there for the duration that the website determines
Example
Analytics cookies are typically 18 months
Other can be 18 months to 18 years
Help identify a unique browser to our website, closest thing to tracking a “person”/”unique visitor”
Contain not always a Personally Identifiable Information (PII) data.
Random string of numbers or alphabets that only the company who set the cookie can read.

15. DoubleClick Tracking

16. Adchoice Example Cleared all cookies Visit USPS.com Visit AARP.com
Visit Allstate.com
Three website that are used to track user preference by Adchoice

17. Adchoice Example
Visit website that have banner hosted for Adchoice including
Yahoo.com
msn.com

19. Flash Cookies Tougher version of tracking cookie
Also called super cookie or Evercookie
It respawn regular cookies that were deleted and recreate user profile.
Supercookies are harder to locate and delete
Stored in different location then regular cookie
Browser does not know the location
Since it is a plug-in

20. Web Beacons
reported by Colorado-based Privacy Foundation for monitoring Internet users
Used by advertising circles, but not publicized to internet users
small graphic image placed in web pages or messages
Facilitate third party tracking of users and collection of statistics
1-pixel x 1-pixel transparent GIF
Invisible
To see the web beacon, we view the source of HTML page or message

21. Web Beacons Single 1x1 image fetched from DoubleClick
Bugs alerts Doubleclick to each individuals that view the website quicken.com
Double click has systems for monitoring individuals who view DoubleClick advertisements
This web beacon allow Intuit to use DoubleClick monitoring system without the need to first show a banner advertisement

22. Web Beacons
This beacon fetches image from media.preferences.com server
Sends unique user identification
Similar to what is found in a cookie

23. Web Beacons Does not need to a 1x1 pixel graphics.
Can be any other content that is pulled from a third-party we server
Can be used to monitor its user
Impact privacy by introducing a third party into a consumer web site relationship

25. Uses of Web Bugs
According to Privacy Foundataion, companies use web bugs to accomplish the following tasks:
Gather viewing and usage statistics for a particular page. 
Correlate usage statistics between multiple web sites.
Profile users of a web site by gender, age, Zip code, and other demographics.
Transfer personally identifiable information from the web site directly to an Internet marketing company. This transfer would be accomplished with a web bug URL that contains the personal information that the company wishes to transfer.
Transfer search strings from a search engine to a marketing company.
Verify the statistics reported by a banner advertising company, to gauge the effectiveness of different banner advertisements.
Have third-party providers prepare web usage statistics for web sites that do not have the technical capability to prepare their own statistics.
Check if messages are actually read, and, if they are read, to see if they are forwarded.
Detect copyright infrignement

26. Fingerprinting Devices
Take combinations of unique properties of the computer
Browser
Operating system
Screen resolution
Plug-ins installed
Create an algorithm to make the best possible guess about the user without ever installing anything on the computer
BlueCava are currently implementing this algorithm

27. ISP Tracking
All information must first pass through the providers computers
ISP can determine the web sites that user frequent or articles that were viewed
By tracking this information, Internet provider can tell if its users are intereseted in boats or car, care about fashion or medical illness