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Comcast says it will not sell customer browsing histories
- RunawayGalaxy 10y ago"But we'll keep that option right here on the table..." /s
- matmo 10y agoExactly. My first thought was they must be giving it for "free" or trading it for other services rather than "selling" it.
- dvdhnt 10y agoWhere does it say that? Maybe those in control of ISPs realize that they have no individual protection from this practice, unlike other shady practices like inaccurate billing and poor customer service, and genuinely have no interest in doing so. Update: I'm not asking sarcastically and my hope is obviously full of optimism.
- dvdhnt 10y agoThey do specifically say "individual" browser history. Perhaps, they do sell aggregate data which I personally am not for or against. As long as they stick to this policy, I will appreciate it given their history of not showing compassion for individual customers. Update: it does specifically mention aggregate data.
- monocasa 10y agoDo they deanonymize aggregate data? Are they basically just saying "we won't sell to small fries", or is there an actual privacy concern here?
- dvdhnt 10y agoGood questions. I honestly can't come to a guess. On one hand, making the data anonymous would explain the interest in crazy fingerprinting methods and why companies that do that aren't very well known. On the other hand, I have no strong evidence to support the idea that an ISP would anonymize data given their history of activity in the name of profits and in spite of customer satisfaction.
- r00fus 10y agoConsidering how capable de-anonymizing capabilities are even a few years ago [1], it doesn't matter if it's "personal" or aggregated, unless great pains [2] are taken to prevent that. Comcast selling any data is a concern, I will continue to assume my information is being collected and act as best as I can to prevent that (VPN, poisoning my dataflow,etc). [1] https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2007/12/anonymity_and_t_2.html https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2007/12/anonymity_and... [2] http://www.computerworld.com/article/3088179/apple-mac/what-apple-users-need-to-know-about-differential-privacy.html http://www.computerworld.com/article/3088179/apple-mac/what-...
- munchbunny 10y agoAd industry person here. It's not really aggregate data in the sense that any records about you are still individually separated. You're not anonymized by getting mixed into a bigger pool of data points. The usual rule is that the buyer won't get your records by name but will know more or less where you live, how old you are, political leanings, hobbies and interests, etc. So you have some anonymized ID number or set of cookies attached to you. However, if you think about it, from the perspective of the advertiser your name is one of the less valuable things about you. So... you might be anonymous by name, but the name thing is a bit of a red herring.
- YCode 10y agoShot in the dark: their infrastructure isn't set up for it yet, so they may as well take the high road for now.
- undersuit 10y agoDifferent shot in the dark: the largest home internet provider in the US finds it far more profitable to use the data for internal projects.
- qeternity 10y agoThis. Why sell the raw materials when you can sell the finished product? That's where the value add is.
- blackaspen 10y agoHah. They'll sell it one way or another -- it's too good of a revenue stream to pass up, provided you're legally allowed to pursue it.
- Mendenhall 10y agoThey will not sell it now! but when the hubub blows over they will then change "rules" to sell it without saying a word.
- 0xfeba 10y agoLike their data caps. A while ago I saw a progress bar on my account page. It had a caption: "For informational purposes only" and was a data usage bar out of ~300GB. News picked this up and Comcast said: "No, we aren't doing data caps at this time". Months later, they formally rolled out data caps of 300GB.
- dhimes 10y agoEven if they mean well, eventually a board member is going to wonder how to make the next $250M. Then this idea will come up. If it's not expressly forbidden, and it will boost the bottom line, eventually somebody will be compelled to do it. Fiduciary responsibility and all that.
- adrenalinelol 10y ago> said Gerard Lewis, Comcast's chief privacy officer. I didn't know Chief Privacy Officers were a thing. When did this start?
- jeffcore 10y agoIt looks like it became widespread in the early 2000s, in the U.S. at least [0]. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chief_privacy_officer https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chief_privacy_officer
- AstroJetson 10y agoWhen people started complaining about internet privacy. But remember, the Chief Human Resources Officer historically isn't on the side of employees. I'm of the view point that the CPO (*) isn't on the side of consumers. But it looks good to have one. (Sorry to all of the Chief Petty Officers)
- pcarolan 10y agoAfter many years of frustration and disgust, Ive been pretty happy with comcast in the last couple years. Reputation matters. Hopefully they keep it up.
- jasonkostempski 10y agoI'm guessing sometime in the last couple years they got some competition in your area.
- tomschlick 10y agoSame. I hate them as a company but I have been happy with my service over the past 2 years. Consistently get the speeds advertised or better, no random fees on my bill, and have only had 2 service outages (both due to storms).
- chrisallick 10y agotoo corrupt didn't read. burn them all down and bathe in their ashes.
- dang 10y agoPlease don't do this here.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- MrZongle2 10y ago...until they choose otherwise, when there is less attention paid to the matter.
- hermitdev 10y agoI want it, in writing, as part of my contract (with spelled out liability and fiduciary damages), or the claim is not worth the bytes transmitted over the internet to make this statement.
- rajathagasthya 10y agoSo I'm just supposed to take their word for it? If there's one company which I absolutely do not trust as a consumer, it's Comcast.
- joshuaheard 10y agoIt seems to me that my internet connection is the same as a telephone connection. The telephone company cannot listen in on my calls to see if I mention "aspirin" then try to sell me aspirin. The same should go for my internet connection. The content should be completely private, including the metadata such as browsing history.
- paulcole 10y ago> It seems to me that my internet connection is the same as a telephone connection You're definitely free to see it this way, but so far (for the most part) the people in power definitely don't agree.
- narrowrail 10y agoI think this whole thing is being driven by Verizon and AT&T being jealous of FB, GOOG, and AMZN. The NASDAQ is setting records and these execs think they can get it on it (or appear to) and see the same results without customer backlash.
- 0xfeba 10y agoIIRC, that is the difference that a common carrier designation would make.
- alasdair_ 10y agoEven with that analogy, the telephone company can see which numbers you dial, and when. It can make inferences based on that. Did you call an escort service at night and an STD clinic in the morning? Do you regularly call televangelist donation hotline numbers? Do you get a lot of calls from recruiters? The phone company knows all of that stuff - it's one of the issues with the NSA's collection of "just metadata".
- wmf 10y agoThis is one reason phone companies are regulated; are they allowed to make such inferences? Are they allowed to do anything with such inferences?
- newsat13 10y agoIn other news, WhatsApp said their mission is about building a company that is not about ads. We got suckered into it thinking it's pay-for-use app.
- UnoriginalGuy 10y agoSo Comcast spent over $1m[0] in donations and more on lobbying for this specific piece of legislation only to turn around and say they won't take advantage of it? They've just released this statement today because everyone is so upset, they're going bide their time, wait for this to blow over and then quietly start selling more and more invasive customer information. You don't spend millions on a law you have no intention of utilising. They bring up their "targeted ad network" which you can "opt out" of in the same blog post. I wonder what "nonsensitive" information they'll be providing their ad partners about you? And what is stopping Ad Partners from cross-referencing several ad networks? [0] http://resistancereport.com/class-war/comcast-congress-browser-history/ http://resistancereport.com/class-war/comcast-congress-brows...
- ozaark 10y agoThis. No one seems to be putting these facts together. It's a puff piece to distract from their intentions, which unfortunately is working very well. I am astonished that a company can lobby successfully in the name of "consumer interest" when ranked the worst in customer satisfaction (for years).
- joshjje 10y agoNot to mention its a giant monopoly that has very little regulation that matters when you have no choice but to use them. Theres only a few outcomes this will play out to in my mind. Either things will get so bad theyll be split up and/or regulated as a public utility and such, or there will be some sort of big revolution / revolt / underground market (think tor, mesh networks, etc.), OR the populace will be made more docile than they are now big brother style until one of the first two options eventually comes to pass in the wheel of life.
- thedevil 10y ago"We do not sell our broadband customers’ individual web browsing history. We did not do it before the FCC’s rules were adopted, and we have no plans to do so." He didn't say "we won't". He said "we aren't currently" which means "we're keeping the option open but we're trying to sound good right now".
- 0xfeba 10y agoAnd he qualified it with "individual" browsing history, and "3rd parties". I'm sure they aggregate it, and they own NBC and Universal.
- knieveltech 10y agoComcast also quotes grossly unrealistic bandwidth ratings on their service packages, and makes laughable claims about the availability of tech support and field techs. Comcast says all kinds of stuff.
- bisRepetita 10y agoIf I browse on https only, if websites were to use CDNs IP addresses that are used by many different sites, what could Comcast track from me? They could see my DNS requests, which I believe are in clear, even if I use Google's name servers. They would know the sites I go to, but not the pages/bookmarks... If name resolutions were encrypted, we would be good, or ?
- RamshackleJ 10y agoWell currently name resolutions are not encrypted and I don't think it is technically possible to encrypt them, so we definitely aren't good. Asking everyone to route through a CDN is a bit impractical as well. a good follow up article if you're interested: https://www.teamupturn.com/reports/2016/what-isps-can-see https://www.teamupturn.com/reports/2016/what-isps-can-see Even a tiny bit of data(think DNS name resolution) collected over a long period of time can be pretty invasive to a persons privacy.
- af16090 10y agoThis is a good visualization of what is shown when using HTTPS: https://www.eff.org/pages/tor-and-https https://www.eff.org/pages/tor-and-https
- openasocket 10y agoVery few sites have everything on a CDN, and that's not really possible for a large class of websites. So they can get IP addresses for web servers, which with reverse DNS they can get the domain name. They can also analyze the number of incoming versus outgoing packets to make certain inferences, like being able to tell whether you're watching a video on Facebook or upload one. That last one isn't that useful for advertising or anything, though, and requires TCP sessionization, which is tricky to scale, so I doubt they would do that.
- daxelrod 10y ago> If name resolutions were encrypted, we would be good, or ? No, HTTPS Server Name Identification[1] means that domain names are still sent in the clear so that multiple HTTPS sites can have one IP address. They can also see how much data goes is transmitted to which site, when, and for how long, which lets them infer all sorts of other information about your activity
- suprgeek 10y agoWhy do they need to sell browsing histories? There are numerous way to profit without actually selling history: 1) Come buy our trueTarget analytic service - add a keyword search and out comes the name of every one interested in say "Evening college" (Comcast also has the address on file obviously) 2) Political observers - This Zipcode has the most mentions for "Climate change hoax" 3) Porn/Medical/<other potentially embarrassing stuff> : Too many services here - None of this sells individual browsing history yet which of these would be certainly illegal? This is a complete red herring to distract from the Republicans completely disgraceful sell out to big business. If not illegal which of these would be ok under "we do not see your browsing history"?
- shuntress 10y ago"Por que no los dos?" They can do all of those things and in addition sell your history to make more money.
- chrisper 10y agoMaybe they will lower the data caps and then ask you if you are willing to sell your data in exchange for more data...
- mundo 10y agoDid they promise not to analyze my browser history to figure out what kind of consumer I am, how much money I have, whether I have kids, etc, and then rent access to that information through a targeted ad delivery service? Gonna guess no. This seems like an empty promise designed to fool people who just don't understand how "selling browser history" is actually implemented.
- tunap 10y agoWhat they did not say is the how they will monetize the data. There is no "if", they are a business and they/their ilk just bought the reg/dereg to make their business more money. Full stop.
- Jack-Harkness 10y agoi was hoping all of this was a april fools joke but sadly its not. Obviously they will sell the acitivities. If you keep milk infront of a cat, she will obviously drink it. Guess we will have to turn to privacy guarding services like tor, purevpn and duckduckgo. I wonder which right will be removed next? We should buy their history to be put on display. Then they would know how it feels
- Jack-Harkness 10y agoi was hoping all of this was a april fools joke but sadly its not. Obviously they will sell the acitivities. If you keep milk infront of a cat, she will obviously drink it. Guess we will have to turn to privacy guarding services like tor, purevpn and duckduckgo. I wonder which right will be removed next? We should buy their history to be put on display. Then they would know how it feels
- Overtonwindow 10y agoOh yes they will...
- guelo 10y agoWhat they're going to build is the ultimate undeletable tracking cookie. That's what this is all about. They want in on that ad money.
- bogomipz 10y ago>"What they have been after forever is the ultimate undeletable tracking cookie" Can you elaborate? What is this undeletable tracking cookie?
- _RPM 10y agoSomeone please provide context, what happened in the last week that I missed?
- ryanpcmcquen 10y agohttps://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2017/03/congress-sides-cable-and-telephone-industry https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2017/03/congress-sides-cable-a...
- Joeri 10y ago... for now. A promise by a for-profit company is hilariously useless unless they bake it into a contract. The leadership have an obligation to shareholders to break promises if it improves profitability.
- paulddraper 10y ago> The leadership have an obligation to shareholders to break promises if it improves profitability. Officers of a corporation have a responsibility to act in good faith for the best interest of its members. But that can include acting in long-term best interests too. Contrary to what you may believe, no one will indict Comcast leadership for not harvest and selling info. Also, remember "good faith". E.g. MS shareholders can't indict leadership for Windows 8 ;)
- manquer 10y agoMorality has naught to do with it. Economics dictate that shareholders will dump Comcast for more profitable companies if they feel Comcast is no longer attractive enough, or if comcast is able to generate additional revenue by selling ads, then reward by buying more and driving up its price
- ryanpcmcquen 10y agoThis was intended to release tomorrow.
- doktrin 10y agoI know I should be cynical, but as a Comcast customer I appreciate the gesture. These days I'll take what I can get, and if private companies are the only ones to even half heartedly act in the benefit of ordinary people so be it.
- mtrpcic 10y agoThis is super pedantic, but it can be confusing to call Comcast a "private company", which implies they are privately owned (which they are not, they are NASDAQ:CMCSA). The proper term is a "private sector" company. Minor nomenclature nitpick, just trying to keep everyone informed and make sure that the terms "Privately Owned" and "Private Sector" don't get conflated.
- brilliantcode 10y agoHow many times do we need to be fooled? We've seen enough of corporations behaving badly and doing the exact opposite of what they claim. What reasons do we have to believe they are telling the truth?
- bighi 10y ago"I promise I will not kill you", says the guy pointing a gun to your face.
- educar 10y agoDo you have a choice not a believe him :)
- WheelsAtLarge 10y agoI'm I the only person that thinks that Comcast is saying this as a way to calm people down now. Why did they not speak up before the vote. I suspect that within a few years, once the noise quiets, they'll have a thriving business doing just what they said they would not do.
- icantdrive55 10y agoAs one of the more disliked companies; Comcast should send out a legal notice promising not to sell viewer's data. They could stipulate that even if they sold, that legal notice would be contingent on sale. It might keep some people from leaving? "Remember that one time Comcast looked out for their customers?" Will they do it--no, they would rather keep dumping money into those commercials, about we're just late 1:59 hours.
- seppin 10y agoyes
- thr0waway1239 10y agoApparently, Thomas Jefferson once said, "Once a generation or so, we need a rebellion and the folks who participate should be punished, but not too harshly". I think he was getting at the point of how easily people take their freedoms for granted, and this apathy in turn takes away all the freedoms which were earned with great difficulty in the first place. Maybe we have reached a point where we need to permit folks (immunity against legal action) to release internal data/documents of BigTech, provided it unequivocally proves that such public statements the companies make are false.
- drenvuk 10y agoAssuming every site is using https I'm not sure how they would be able to make money off of this with web based advertising since you can't inject ads. Does anyone know how else they could make money?
- roc 10y agoGood old fashioned junk mail, background check services, and consumer research? Even if they keep their literal word and don't sell your actual history, and you use SSL so they can't see specific content, they can certainly make money by identifying traffic profiles by domains/times/frequencies/etc.
- emveeoh 10y agoCan someone explain to me why there is no Federal regulation requiring the ISP, and anyone else collecting data on us, to provide full disclosure to the customer whose data is being collected? Also, why are there no laws requiring an audit process on erroneous data? In America, the credit reporting agencies are required to provide a free detailed report annually and there is a legally-mandated dispute process in place for false/erroneous data. Why don't we have the same protections/process for metadata collection? Instead of expecting data-collecting companies to police themselves, we must insist on regulation requiring free, full disclosure of all data collected and a legal process to have false/erroneous data collection challenged and removed. The biggest danger is not that they collect this information, but that there is no AUDIT PROCESS to correct false information.
- InclinedPlane 10y agoCorruption? Lobbying? Regulatory capture? Influence peddling? Crony capitalism? I'm not really sure what answer you're looking for here. The basic answer is that the system is corrupt and the interests of big corporations are heard much louder than the interests of individual constituents who don't have as many dollars to throw around capitol hill.
- emveeoh 10y agoThe reality is: privacy is no longer possible in a connected world. So, rather than worrying about collection/privacy. Maybe, the best use of our energy is best-spent trying to pass laws that standardize disclosure to the customer and the mandating of an audit process...?
- natch 10y agoNot sell, just rent / lease / give to partners / share / trade / exploit.
- michaelrhansen 10y agoUntil they decide to sell it. And tell no one.
- bjd2385 10y agoBecause I'm about to believe anything a corporation or company says on the Internet...
- wskemper 10y agoI work for a small satellite ISP, ViaSat (d/b/a Exede). Part of my job is data security specifically for this type of information. We've had it in our privacy policy since Day 1 back in 2012 that we don't give or sell this data to anyone who doesn't actually need it, and certainly not to advertisers. One of the things that makes me proud to work here. https://www.exede.com/documents/master/exede-subscriber-privacy-policy.pdf https://www.exede.com/documents/master/exede-subscriber-priv...
- ouid 10y agoSociety does not function on the honor system.
- dmschulman 10y agoThis whole debacle is an incredible opportunity for any small ISP upstart. It's a shame that it's so difficult to build an ISP in the current market due to federal and state regulations that the big telecoms lobbied for. If people had alternatives which touted privacy, security, speed, price, and had the right network backbone there would be a deluge of customers migrating away from Comcast, AT&T, Verizon, etc.
- my_first_acct 10y agoIn the SF Bay Area, there is sonic.net. Their privacy policy: https://wiki.sonic.net/wiki/Category:Policies#Privacy https://wiki.sonic.net/wiki/Category:Policies#Privacy Also, a blog post on the recent law: https://corp.sonic.net/ceo/2017/03/29/privacy-matters/ https://corp.sonic.net/ceo/2017/03/29/privacy-matters/
- NelsonMinar 10y agoYou underestimate the cost of the physical infrastructure to be an "ISP upstart".
- joshjje 10y agoNot of its made a public utility or whatever, infrastructure seized or whatever it is they would need to do to like what was done with telephone lines. Unless you are referring to the current state of affairs.
- NelsonMinar 10y agoI'm referring to the idea of a "small ISP upstart". A public utility approach is an entirely different thing with different problems. The physical infrastructure is still expensive.
- deelowe 10y agoOf course they won't. This is all about changing the model for delivering ads. Does no one see the link between this, net neutrality, and the boycott?
- salesguy222 10y agoWhich is why they lobbied for the bill to be passed, right! It'll be just like the FBI v Apple saga. "We need the courts and Congress to give us some very specific powers." "Wow, thanks for doing that! We see people are pretty mad for legitimate reasons. Don't worry, we are not going to use those powers we asked for. We're only going to use it to go after BAD GUYS. Trust us!"
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- Spooky23 10y agoIt was weasel worded. "Individual data" won't be sold.
- HenryBemis 10y agoAnd perhaps they will not "sell it". They will probably buy out an ad-company (if they don't own a couple already) and the will keep the data for themselves ;)
- simcop2387 10y agoOr the third party ad company will sell it. either way it's not going to be pleasant.
- adrr 10y agoThey'll rent it out instead.
- arkades 10y agoThey do have a wholly owned subsidiary ad company, it's called Comcast Spotlight.
- lithos 10y agoThen replace anything that looks like an ad with their network. While offering other ad networks the ability to not get their ads replaced. Since they're more likely to stay silent.
- tmaly 10y agoReading through all the comments, it seems they could play with the wording and sell aggregate data. The end result of all this is that the data is sold to some company that is either the end company or some intermediate company. From that you get some creepy ad emailed, physically mailed, or you get a call on your cell phone about Solar panels and a trip to the Bahamas. It would ideal to have a list of the end company that delivers this creep so consumers as a group to make an informed choice if they wish to do business with companies taking part in this.
- ionwake 10y agoApril fools
- mightykan 10y ago... for now. Once the news cycle ends, Comcast will be one of the first companies to sell this information and make tons of money. Verizon is already there[1]. [1]: https://www.engadget.com/2017/03/31/eff-verizon-will-install-spyware-on-all-its-android-phones/ https://www.engadget.com/2017/03/31/eff-verizon-will-install...
- lettergram 10y agoYeah.. I trust you, thats my VPN is already in place.
- throwaway667 10y agoguys, time for a community owned DNS service with end to end encryption, so ISPs wouldn't be able to tell anyone's browsing history (or Internet history for that matter)
- joelthelion 10y ago"Butcher says it will refrain from using more than 20% human meat"
- lmkg 10y agoCharitable interpretation: Comcast thinks that being the one ISP not to sell your browser history will be a market differentiator. Uncharitable interpretation: Comcast is a content provider in addition to an ISP. Their interest is in using the data themselves rather than selling it.
- banku_brougham 10y agoIts too late for talk like that. I've shown my friends and family how to use a VPN, and explained why it is so important. Eventually I'll roll one myself that we all use. And maybe, just maybe we can all put an end to this evil if we each act rationally.
- cowardlydragon 10y agoRiiiight.... It will outsource the sales to a subsidiary that will do it...
- joshmn 10y agoAnd Trump will drain the swamp.
- bnolsen 10y agouneducated people here. obama pushed the flawed rule in just before leaving office just to evoke this type hysteria. the way things are now is how they have been forever.