Adware maker joins federal privacy board | Tech News on ZDNet:
“The Department of Homeland Security has named Claria, an adware maker that online publishers once dubbed a ‘parasite,’ to a federal privacy advisory board.
An executive from Claria, formerly called Gator, will be one of 20 members of the committee, the department said Wednesday.
‘This committee will provide the department with important recommendations on how to further the department’s mission while protecting the privacy of personally identifiable information of citizens and visitors of the United States,’ Nuala O’Connor Kelly, the department’s chief privacy officer, said in a statement.
Claria bundles its pop-up advertising software with ad-supported networks such as Kazaa. Recently, the privately held company has been trying to seek credibility by following stricter privacy guidelines and offering behavioral profiling services to its partners.
In the past, Claria’s pop-up ad software has riled some users who claimed it was annoying, installed without permission, and not easy to delete. Publishers also were irked about pop-up ads for a rival’s product appearing next to their own Web sites. Catalog retailer L.L. Bean sued Gator for alleged trademark infringement.”
Our tax dollars at work.
The world is all upside down!
And we have the FTC outlining the indicators of Spyware here in text and pdf form.
NOTE: Originally posted: February 2005 (recreated from mangled original bambismusings.blogspot.com)
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