As it has just received approval to be a provider of the Digital Advertising Alliance’s Self Regulatory Program, ad verifier DoubleVerify announced that it would incorporate the “Forward I” Advertising Option Icon to its Online Behavioral Advertising product and offer it as a free add-on to verification customers until June 2011.

DoubleVerify, which delivers 35 billion verified impressions monthly, is the second company to be approved as a provider following Better Advertising.

Since it users the same ad tag as DoubleVerify’s verification solutions, clients will be able to add the OBA compliance technology with a simple click in the interface. The technology also includes options for the placement of the Forward I icon, disclosure information and opt-out link management and extensive reporting on compliance.

“Self-regulation is the right approach for online advertising and our work with the DAA gives the industry the confidence to continue growing while staying ahead of industry regulations,” said Oren Netzer, DoubleVerify CEO. “To help speed up the adoption of the self-regulatory program, we’re offering our OBA Compliance product to our verification customers at no extra charge until June 2011. With no cost associated, no negotiation and no implementation hassle, advertisers can adhere to industry standards with a click of a button.”

The DAA is a group effort at behavioral targeting industry self-regulation by the American Association of Advertising Agencies (AAAA or 4A’s), the American Advertising Federation (AAF), the Association of National Advertisers (ANA), the Direct Marketing Association (DMA) and the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB). The alliance released its seven Self-Regulatory Principles for Online Behavioral Advertising in July 2009.

The decision is most likely a pre-emptive move in the wake of widespread privacy concerns in the online advertising industry as a whole. The House Committee on Energy and Congress recently asked Yahoo and 32 other companies to fork over information on the Web-surfing data they collect to launch targeted ad campaigns.

Yahoo already offers an opt-out option for users who don’t want targeted ads delivered by Yahoo to third-party sites, but this change will affect many more users and could signal a sea change in the BT industry as a whole. Targeted ads are clearly much more efficient money-makers than random display ads, but most consumers would choose to opt out if given the chance, the Post reports.

The Internet pioneer’s decision to let users opt-out will probably not satisfy the fiercest privacy advocates because the company would still collect the data on surfers’ habits – an activity it deems necessary for a variety of reasons.

“As a business, we collect data for many reasons, including legal reporting, fraud detection, financial auditing, law enforcement compliance and research to improve our services,” Kelley Benander, a Yahoo spokeswoman, told the Post.

Wikia, a for-profit Web-hosting service created by the founders of the uber-popular Wikipedia, will have GamePro ads served on its thousands of branded gaming wikis from World of Warcraft, Super Smash brothers and others. The deal was created to target specific content strands – and is projected to garner more than 300 million ad impressions a month.

Wikia will double GamePro’s online reach to more than 14.8 million uniques, the company said. GamePro can also provide advertisers with access to 8.7 million unique gamers that can’t be found on GameSpot or IGN. The company plans to create a widget that will allow Wikia authors to grab content across GamePro’s network and use it within their own wiki.

GamePro’s media network includes BlogFaction.com, GamePro.com and Games.net; advertisers include Toyota and Gillette.

Trulia Pro allows agents to differentiate their online brands with two new services: unlimited features listings and unlimited local spotlight ads. The site attracts about 5 million visitors a month.

The unlimited features listings service helps agents hoist their listings to the top of relevant searches (leading to four to seven times more views of the featured property, the company said). The spotlight ads put brands front-and-center in front of local buyers and sellers through targeted ads and on relevant search results pages.

Trulia Pro costs $39 per month or $348 for an annual subscription.

“Trulia Pro is designed as a great starter-kit for agents looking to reach local home buyers and sellers, and serves as a cost-effective alternative for agents who are spending more advertising dollars than they need to on other sites or in print media,” said Sami Inkinen, co-founder of Trulia, in a written statement.

Trulia recently launched the Trulia Ad Network, which gives advertisers access to 10 million unique visitors per month across Trulia’s network of targeted real estate sites.

This latest cash infusion comes on the heels of a $3.5 million investment led by Comcast Interactive Capital, with Edison Venture Fund also participating. The William Morris Agency is also a backer.

“We continue to witness an evolution towards a more fragmented media landscape online, especially amongst the ‘in the know’ male 18-34 demographic, as new long-tail sites, communities and blogs capture their attention,” said SoftBank Capital’s Jordan Levy. “Giant Realm recognizes this evolution, and is able to provide scale and access for advertisers by aggregating and connecting with these audiences in meaningful ways.”

Giant Realm plans to expand its online platform, which currently attracts about 4.2 million unique monthly viewers, according to comScore.

Part of the deal stipulated that Jordan Levy, a partner at SoftBank, will Giant Realm’s board of directors; Michael Perlis, also a partner at SoftBank, has been named a board observer.

Blinkx will place contextually relevant ads in the footage and will share the resulting ad revenue with Hearst. Financial details weren’t disclosed.

“Handbag.com is enormously popular because of its relevant, fresh content for women,” said Suranga Chandratillake, founder and CEO, blinkx. “We are thrilled to add their video content to blinkx.com, giving our women viewers access to high-quality lifestyle videos, on demand and in easy-to-consume formats.”

Separately, Hearst Magazines is adding another notch in its stylish interactive belt by allowing readers to send text messages to buy products they see in the company’s magazines, which run the gamut for the gamine Cosmopolitan to the granny-esque Good Housekeeping.

Hearst is using ShopText technology to also allow readers to request free samples and enter sweepstakes by texting keywords from the pages of its magazines. CosmoGirl readers are likely squealing with delight: 100,000 have reportedly used the technology (Hearst has a two-year history with ShopText) to enter sweepstakes last summer alone.

Blinkx has been busy lately: just yesterday, the company announced an interactive advertising and content partnership with The Poker Channel.

The site is spearheading a new ad model in which advertising sponsors will help members fulfill “their stupidest wish ever.” The concept is still in development, but it’s seen as key to the growth of the site and its parent IAC/InterActiveCorp., which plans to spin off four of its businesses so it can focus on interactive advertising and media, Reuters reports.

Banner ads no longer cut the mustard, CollegeHumor co-founder Ricky Van Veen told Reuters, explaining his site’s new approach to integrating advertisements with a user’s overall experience.

“Now advertisers won’t even talk to you unless you have a great topline idea, something cool,” Van Veen told Reuters. “They use the banners and the rest of the stuff to support the deal.”

CollegeHumor is currently offering a paid summer job for a comedy writer wannabe – sponsored by Virgin Mobile.

Quigo is a web site and content-targeted advertising company. The acquisition of Quigo lets AOL expand the use of contextual advertising – which matches ads to the contents of a Web page – across AOL’s own Web pages, as well as its third-party networks. Quigo will operate as a wholly owned subsidiary of AOL within its Platform-A organization. AOL originally announced its intention to acquire Quigo on November 7, 2007.

Pharmacies and grocery stores have long targeted offers, but there are many new ways marketers can use personal information to tailor advertising messages. They’re able to gather information about personal interests by tracking Internet use and digital media viewing habits, among other things, and then tailor messages accordingly. Consumers benefit from the customization as they receive ads relevant to them instead of those intended for mass consumption that may have no utility for them at all.

The marketing landscape is being transformed through the availability of new technologies. Social networks Facebook and News Corp.’s (NWS) MySpace recently joined the ranks of behavioral marketers (BusinessWeek.com, 11/7/07). Telecommunications giant Verizon Communications (VZ) has unveiled a plan to mine data from its wireless and wire-line customers. And data powerhouse Acxiom (ACXM) recently announced a new service geared toward personalized marketing.

How personal data will be used to tailor communications with consumers in the future is not exactly known, as new technologies rapidly emerge. For marketers and their targets, though, the marketing world will change. Discussions about how to best protect privacy amid this transformation are well under way, with some calling for an overhaul in regulation. But what’s really needed is the better application of existing guidelines, rather than the creation of a new set of rules.

Too Much Protection?

The theme at the recently concluded meeting of the International Data Protection & Privacy Commissioners in Montreal was “Terra Incognita,” a reference to the unknown future ways that technology will collect and use personal data. While much of the attention was on the new ways that governments can collect and use data, some concluded that privacy laws on the collection and use of personal information are outdated and increasingly irrelevant, with greater restrictions needed.

In that vein, a coalition of U.S. privacy organizations recently demanded that the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) set up a “do not track” list (BusinessWeek.com, 11/5/07) that would let consumers surf the Web not just anonymously but also shielded from targeted marketing that uses anonymous data to tailor online advertising.

This would take privacy law to a new level, where protection is given not only to private data (names, addresses, account numbers, etc.) but also to anonymous data (e.g., data collected through cookie technology), which would be legally regulated. The complexity and enforcement problems with a “do not track” law are enormous. Advocates liken it to the “do not call” rules that pertain to telemarketers, but only the names are similar. Compiling and applying a list of those who do not want tailored advertising will be a technological nightmare. Compliance, to the extent it can occur at all, will be costly. Ultimately, consumers will suffer through increased costs passed on to them, and opportunities for more useful consumer information will be diminished.

Fair Information Practices

Proponents of such a new Web of regulations are overlooking the existing privacy toolbox, principally the practices that have developed under the umbrella of Fair Information Practices. Informed consumers can, using the tools available right now on their computers and choices companies provide them, control the extent to which they are subject to behavioral marketing.

The FTC explains how Fair Information Practices underlie current privacy laws this way:

“Over the past quarter century, government agencies in the United States, Canada, and Europe have studied the manner in which entities collect and use personal information—their “information practices”—and the safeguards required to assure those practices are fair and provide adequate privacy protection. The result has been a series of reports, guidelines, and model codes that represent widely accepted principles concerning fair information practices.”

While the national frameworks for implementation of the Fair Information Practices differ, with the European Union countries being more prescriptive and the U.S. more self-regulatory, the bedrock element of all is the concept that consumers should be informed of how their personal data may be used so they can make educated choices. In short, transparency is the key. And in the U.S., if companies say one thing in their privacy policies but do another in the collection and use of personal data, the FTC will step in to enforce. Practice is measured against promises.

Competitive Spirit

The five major search engines—Google (GOOG), Yahoo (YHOO), Microsoft (MSFT), Ask.com (IACI), and Time Warner’s (TWX) AOL—were recently lauded by the Center for Democracy & Technology (CDT) for changes in their privacy practices, specifically with respect to how search data (search terms, cookies, and IP addresses) will be handled.

The CDT said the changes show that competition works. The competition was made possible by visibility of the changes in the privacy policies of the various companies, which provide the notice and choices to consumers. Others disagree with the CDT over the extent to which the Googles of the world have gone to protect data. In any event, adherence to Fair Information Practices has allowed the debate by providing notice to consumers and to the world over how data is being handled (and what the choices are for consumers before they use the search engine).

User-Friendly Privacy Practices

An overhaul of the existing privacy framework, including the addition of “do not track” regulations, is not necessary. Fair Information Practices are expected to remain the foundation of privacy law for some time to come. So, with the advent of new technologies to collect personal data and tailor marketing messages, the fundamental issue is how the information about data use (and the attendant choices available) is communicated, not whether technology using personal data to engage in behavioral marketing should be regulated. In short, how clear and useful are privacy policies?

The FTC and the financial services community have been engaged in an exercise this year to standardize and streamline the privacy notices sent to consumers under the Gramm-Leach-Bliley (GLB) act. I agree with critics who say the notices sent to consumers in the past—often printed in tiny typeface on flimsy paper, and ignored—need a makeover. The strictures proposed in terms of content, format, and presentation have generated criticism for being inflexible and for stifling innovation in communications with consumers. Whether a standard form emerges remains to be seen.

Outside of the GLB realm, no such proposals for standard forms have been made. So there is a real opportunity for companies collecting consumer data for tailored marketing to communicate in new, clearer, and more consumer-friendly ways in order to provide the notice and choice that are the bedrock Fair Information Practices principles. Privacy policies need to be much more user-friendly. Of course, as a legal matter, the fine print needs to be there. But there is no reason the policies cannot be summarized with headlines in plain English, in a graphically attractive way. Just as dense management reports often contain executive summaries, companies should employ consumer summaries that highlight the privacy provisions. Even video can be used to describe the privacy options available to consumers. Verizon recently experimented with such video information.

Matter of Control

A special opportunity exists for companies that provide wired and wireless voice, video, and data services. The breadth and depth of the data such companies handle makes it incumbent upon them to clearly state their collection, storage, security, and sharing practices, and what the consumer options are with respect to how data are used. Likewise, more and clearer information needs to be provided to consumers regarding how they can use tools on their own computers to control the collection of data at its source.

In the new technological era, marketers will be able to provide more relevant (and more useful) information to consumers based on personal information, but that will only work if people have control over what information they are sharing. Privacy policies therefore will take on an increasingly important role, and companies will (and should) be rewarded for innovations in how such policies are communicated. A new “do not track” bureaucracy is not what is needed.

Christopher Wolf is a litigation partner in the Washington (D.C.) office of Proskauer Rose and chairs the firm’s Privacy & Data Security Practice Group. He is the editor and lead author of the Practising Law Institute treatise Proskauer on Privacy: A Guide to Privacy and Data Security Law in the Information Age.

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