[privacy] ComScore Networks: The Big Brother of the Internet?

[Richard M. Smith]

An earlier write-up on Comscore and how they observe https traffic:


         Blocking Marketscore: Why Cornell Did It
         http://www.cit.cornell.edu/computer/security/marketscore/

The company use to offer a Web acceleration service via http proxy 
servers in order to watch what people do on the Internet.  When I spoke 
to some of their technical people on the phone, I never got a very good 
answer how they were able to speed-up people's broadband connections.....

Richard

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> Via Forbes.com.
>
> [snip]
>
> ComScore Networks is the Big Brother of the Internet. The widely-used
> online research company takes virtual photos of every Web page viewed by
> its 1 million participants, even transactions completed in secure sessions,
> like shopping or online checking. Then comScore aggregates the information
> into market analysis for its over 500 clients, including such large
> companies as Ford Motor, Microsoft and The New York Times Co.
>
> ComScore says that its participants are willing exhibitionists, happily
> selling their online privacy for gift certificates and free screensavers.
> But two computer scientists are raising new questions about comScore,
> claiming that company tracking software is being installed without consent
> on an unknown number of computers.
>
> [snip]
>
> More:
> http://www.forbes.com/security/2006/12/07/internet-security-research-tech_c
> x_ll_1208comscore.html
>
> - - ferg
>
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>
> --
> "Fergie", a.k.a. Paul Ferguson
>  Engineering Architecture for the Internet
>  fergdawg(at)netzero.net
>  ferg's tech blog: http://fergdawg.blogspot.com/
>
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