A COMPANY planning to target advertising at individual users, based on the content of the web pages they view, is pressing ahead with trials in the UK despite a warning that it is breaching European rules on privacy.
In trials the company, Phorm, is running with a UK internet service provider, it intercepts the addresses of any web page that a user requests, and then goes to that page to discover what it contains. Last week, Amazon and Wikipedia said they would deny Phorm access to their web pages, and others are expected to follow.
The that Phorm’s system contravenes a European directive safeguarding the confidentiality of citizens’ communications. It has given the UK two months to tighten regulations governing the interception of users’ private data.
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