The European Competition Commission Goes for the Throat
November 3, 2020
I wanted to note the October 30, 3030, Reuters’ story “Online Giants Will Have to Open Ad Archives to EU Antitrust Regulators.” At last regulators are taking steps to gain access to the systems and methods used by Google and other online ad giants. The news story helps cement Margrethe Vestager as someone who uses her position to do more than posture. Also, the news story points out that there is a research agency called Algorithm Watch.
The problem is that the companies asked to provide information have legal options. The delays are likely to slow the regulators’ quest for data. If sufficient time goes by, the landscape can be reworked. Internet time is different from regulators’ time.
There is a counter point. Navigate to “Monopoly Power Is Less Dangerous Today Than in Past.” The argument set forth in this Telegraph Herald write up is unlikely to have a significant impact on the good ship SS Margrethe.
Stephen E Arnold, November 3, 2020
Google Filtering: How Smart Is Software?
October 27, 2020
I included a screenshot illustrating YouTube search results which make it clear how to obtain without charge copy-protected commercial software. You can read that story and see the screen shot at this link. I want to document a Reuters’ report called “Italy’s Communications Watchdog Fines Google for Betting Ad.” The news item documents that Google was fined for running gambling ads. The DarkCyber research team has been monitoring some of the questionable video streaming sites. Advertisements are appearing on these sites in greater numbers. What vendors are providing these paid messages? At this time, there’s no open source information about the intermediaries involved.
Questions:
- Why doesn’t filtering by key word work for Google advertisements? Gambling seems to be a no brainer.
- Why are Google YouTube search results providing recently updated links to video content which appears to violate a number of rules and regulations? The word “crack” is like gambling a seemingly obvious yellow caution light.
- What are the names of the ad agency intermediaries providing advertisements to what appear to be illegal video streaming sites?
Interesting? The DarkCyber research team finds the subject engaging. Smart software seems to have some blind spots.
Stephen E Arnold, October 27, 2020
Streaming Data: Does the Information Presage the Future for Google Advertising?
October 12, 2020
DarkCyber is not populated with work hour gamers. (Tibby is the exception.) One of the research team spotted “Streamlabs & Stream Hatchet Q3 Live Streaming Industry Report.” The summary contained an interesting factoid, which we assume is spot on. Here it is:
Twitch now represents 91.1% of the market share for hours streamed, up 14.5% from last quarter. This massive increase can be attributed to Mixer’s shutdown, which captured 14.2% of all content live-streamed last quarter. That is compared to Facebook Gaming, which now represents 3.4% of the market share, and increased by 1% since last quarter, and YouTube Gaming, which now represents 5.5% of the market share, and decreased by 1.2% since last quarter.
The data prompted a question from one of the DarkCyber researchers:
What is the likelihood that Amazon’s online streaming advertising follows a similar path?
At lunch on October 8, a number of ideas floated above the miasma of take out Chinese:
- No way, José. Google will find a way to get into the online streaming money flow.
- Yikes. Google may be too distracted by removing features from its lackluster mobile devices, fending off regulators, and dealing with its “human resource” issues to respond in an effective manner.
- The Bezos bulldozer grinds forward. The effectiveness of Amazon in multiple market sectors may push Google and others aside. Product searches and product advertising are likely to be more important as the retail sector in the US erodes.
Which is it? Worth watching.
Stephen E Arnold, October 12, 2020
After 20 Plus Years, Whoa! Surveillance by Big Tech
August 10, 2020
DarkCyber has noted a flurry of write ups expressing surprise, rage, indignation, and blusterification at the idea of a commercial company collecting data. Hello, services are free for a basic reason: Making money. Part of making money is to have something that other companies and organizations will purchase. A good example is personal information about users of free services. The way big companies work is that there is a constant pressure to find new ways to generate money. Thus, there are data sucking apps; there are advertisements and more advertisements; there are subscriptions which lock in revenue while providing an Amazon-style we know a lot about those who shop on Amazon; and there are many ornaments on these methods.
I got a kick out of “Silicon Valley’s Vast Data Collection Should Worry You More Than TikTok.” We know the story well. Commercial firms in the US gather data and license it, often to marketing firms and to other organizations. After two decades of blissful ignorance a devoted band of “real” journalists are now probing the core business model of many technology centric companies.
Give me a break. We are talking decades of business processes designed to generate useful reports from flows of actions by individuals. In some countries, the government performs this task. In others, commercial enterprises do the work and license the normalized data to governments.
This passage from the write up tickled my funny bone:
And none of this is unreasonable. We should be worried about private companies and governments potentially collecting data on millions of unsuspecting people and censoring content they don’t like. But those based in China represent just a sliver of that threat.
Yep, the old “woulda, coulda, shoulda” ploy. May I remind you, gentle reader, that we are decades into the automation of data about the actions of individuals. These are the happy and often ignorant humanoids who download apps, run queries, click on videos, and send personal message while leaving a data trail a foot deep and a mile wide.
And now the need for something?
And data collection is not a technical and economic issue. Nope. Data collection is politics; for example:
TikTok’s critics might point to the increasingly scary behavior of China’s government as to why Chinese control of information is particularly alarming. They’re right about the behavior, but they curiously ignore the fact that the United States itself is currently governed by a far-right demagogue with his own concentration camps and authoritarian repression, and that the party behind him, which aligns entirely with his politics, reliably cycles into power at least once every eight years.
What’s the fix? Well, “oppose it all.”
Where were the regulators, the users, and the competitors 20 years ago? Probably in grade school, blissfully unaware that those handheld gadgets would become more important than other activities. Okay, adult thumbtypers, your outrage is interesting. Step back, and perhaps you can see why the howls of outrage, the references to evil forms of government, and the horrors of toting around a device that usually provides real time documentation of one’s actions as a bad thing.
But after 20 years, is it surprising that personal data actions are captured, analyzed, and used to provide more data “stuff” to consume? As I said, its been 20 years with no lessening of the processes. Complain to your parents. Maybe they dropped the ball? Commercial enterprises and governments are like beavers. And beavers do what beavers do.
Stephen E Arnold, August 10, 2020
Hippy Dippy New Age Insight: Ads Are Numerous
July 30, 2020
I want to keep this brief. The number of ads is increasing. Avoiding them is difficult. Why? Zero controls, zero social responsibility, and zero regulatory oversight.
“I Was Horrified at How Many Ads the New Brave Browser and VPN for iOS Blocked” is amusing because it reveals the lack of awareness of the zip zip mobile world in which some hippy dippy New Age “real” news publications thrive.
The article states:
I visited a few of my favorite sites and then was promptly horrified when it told me that in about 3 minutes of browsing, it had blocked 107 ads and trackers and given me 2 HTTPS upgrades. Supposedly, this saved me five seconds of my life.
Not for long. Online advertisers share some DNA with bad actors creating novel malware. One difference: Law enforcement pursues the malware wizards. Online advertising outfits get invited to testify to a Congressional committee.
Stephen E Arnold, July 30, 2020
Scam Ads: Easy to Do Apparently
July 8, 2020
A somewhat shocking assertion appears in “Easy for Fraudsters to Post Scam Ads on Facebook and Google.” The article reports that researchers posted fake ads on Google:
They found that Google did review the adverts submitted, but failed to verify whether the business was real and did not ask for ID. In under an hour, the adverts were approved by the search engine firm for both dummy businesses, gaining almost 100,000 impressions over the space of a month. The fake advert for Natural Hydration was displayed above the official NHS Scotland pages when users searched for “hydration advice”.
A Facebook ad was given similar treatment:
using a personal Facebook account, Which? created a business page on the social network for Natural Hydration and produced a range of posts with pseudo health advice to promote it. A paid promotion of the page gained some 500 likes in the space of a week. Facebook responded to the investigation saying the page set up by Which? does not violate its community standards and is not currently selling products.
Are these data accurate? Regulatory authorities seem to lack tools to influence the large online advertising monopolies.
Stephen E Arnold, July 8, 2020
Facebook Ad Boycott Risk: The Mark of El Zucko
July 2, 2020
I have a general rule: Those with power are likely to stomp on little people like me. What happens when companies that need access to Facebook users get cute with El Zucko?
Mr. Zuckerberg may not have a sword like El Zorro’s, but he has a digital cattle probe, and he can crank up the voltage.
Moral: A big advertiser better be a heck of a lot bigger than El Zucko, or the advertiser will end up with some memorable Facebook moments. Not all of these love taps with the cattle probe will be “likes.”
The trust outfit published “Facebook Frustrates Advertisers As Boycott over Hate Speech Kicks Off.” The message I carried away from the trust outfit’s “real” news story was that Facebook keeps on being Facebook.
Let’s consider the advertisers’ options:
First, advertisers can route their digital advertising to services which disseminate content on AdF.ly type networks. If you are not familiar with this fine option, check it out. If AdF.ly is a bit too avant garde, there is lovable Alphabet Google YouTube. Ads can appear in interesting contexts. Because the AGY systems are dynamic, one may not know where ads appear. Not to worry, right?
Second, advertisers can run into the arms of those lovable Amazonians. Pitching consulting services on Amazon is tricky, but it is not impossible. Options range from zippy videos for the Twitch.tv consumers, or one can team up with a vendor of something and package one’s consulting service with the tangible product as an after purchase “training” or “support” option.
Third, advertisers can hunt down the ad sales professionals at print publications. These individuals are easy to spot. Their schedules are vacant like their eyes. Well, maybe that is a haunted look related to fear. Just buy space in ever popular publications like the local newspaper. Alternatively why not buy double truck ads in the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times. Those must work. IBM ran it’s “we are in a yellow submarine” ad a few days ago.
Fourth, advertisers can pay search engine optimization experts to pump their message hither and yon using every conceivable type of digital channel available. Everyone loves irrelevant content and links to big company Web sites where emails can be provided and money spent.
Fifth, hang it up. Emulate the businesses which are closing. Blame it on the pandemic, the surge, or whatever.
Net net: Facebook for the foreseeable future has considerable power. El Zucko can keep on doing what he does best; that is, whatever he wants. When he decides to raise ad rates and change the rules of his game, he will. There are ways to implement differential pricing and other types of hair shirt freebies for certain advertisers.
The mark of El Zucko may be a painful burn and a giant Z on an expanse of advertiser skin in the game.
Stephen E Arnold, July 2, 2020
Alphabet Wants to Spell Money with Shop-able Ads
June 30, 2020
Yes, YouTube will become more shop-able. The news shocked no one on the DarkCyber research team. YouTube videos are almost unwatchable. Pre-rolls, interstitials, and post-rolls. Auto-playing of ads when autoplace is set to off. Such convenience, such excellent user experience.
“YouTube Launches a New Ad Format That Showcases Product Images” reports:
YouTube created a new ad format that makes the platform more shoppable. The ad format will feature product images for viewers to browse, by integrating company pages into the video platform. Companies can have products displayed through the new ad format by syncing Google Merchant Center with video ad materials. Following that companies can decide which products to feature.
This sounds exciting. Perhaps advertisers taking a break from Facebook will embrace the new platform? What’s next? How about videos which contain zero YouTube creator content. Just one ad surrounded by the “See Also” ads the magic algorithm suggests.
Relevance? Perfect. Efficient. Plus Aerie might get another Google ad research outsourcing contract. The internal professionals are just too darned busy.
Stephen E Arnold, June 30, 2020
Leo LaPorte Enthusiastically Grabs a New Sponsor
June 29, 2020
Sorry, but I cannot resist. Leo LaPorte, one of the TWIT television stalwarts, has shifted from praising Wasabi and branded his studio in Petaluma. I noted a new advertiser which may suggest that technology companies are responding to the Rona Riot. Unlike NoAgenda, the TWIT outfit depends on advertisers. No Agenda, on the other hand, has built a community. Those in the community support the show: Cash, T shirts, original art, and meet ups.
One surprise for me was that Mr. LaPorte donned a carnival barker attitude and slipped into the erectile dysfunction pitch in a slick way.
Online advertising is pretty annoying. I found the enthusiasm which seemed quite sincere a little warning signal about the direction the outfit is heading.
Give me Wasabi and I will pass on Last Past. The Roman product? That’s for friskier and the young at heart. Tasteful and technical appeal to me. Money is money I assume.
Stephen E Arnold, June 28, 20020
Web Analytics: A Fancy Way of Saying You Have a Blue Ribbon Winning Bloodhound Tracking You
June 18, 2020
DarkCyber is easily confused. Every day brings more incredible cyber security marketing hoo-hah. And each day more incredible security issues come to light. A good example was the Wall Street Journal’s story “Russian Hackers Evaded Firms’ Detection Tools”, Wednesday, June 18, 2020. Yeah, those cyber tools are special.
The story “Lightweight Alternatives to Google Analytics” is a helpful round up of digital bloodhounds. If you are looking for ways to make sense of Web site log files, you can work through the snapshots of such systems as GoatCounter, Plausible, Simple Analytics, and Fathom.
The intriguing segment of the write up is, in DarkCyber’s opinion, this statement:
Google tracks and stores a huge amount of information about users.
A 2018 paper [PDF] by Douglas Schmidt highlights the extent of Google’s tracking, with location tracking on Android devices as one example:
Both Android and Chrome send data to Google even in the absence of any user interaction. Our experiments show that a dormant, stationary Android phone (with Chrome active in the background) communicated location information to Google 340 times during a 24-hour period, or at an average of 14 data communications per hour. The paper distinguishes between “active” and “passive” tracking. Active tracking is when the user directly uses or logs into a Google service, such as performing a search, logging into Gmail, and so on. In addition to recording all of a user’s search keywords, Google passively tracks users as they visit web sites that use GA and other Google publisher tools. Schmidt found that in an example “day in the life” scenario, “Google collected or inferred over two-thirds of the information through passive means”. Schmidt’s paper details how GA cookie tracking works, noting the difference between “1st-party” and “3rd-party” cookies — the latter of which track users and their ad clicks across multiple sites: While a GA cookie is specific to the particular domain of the website that user visits (called a “1st-party cookie”), a DoubleClick cookie is typically associated with a common 3rd-party domain (such as doubleclick.net). Google uses such cookies to track user interaction across multiple 3rd-party websites. When a user interacts with an advertisement on a website, DoubleClick’s conversion tracking tools (e.g. Floodlight) places cookies on a user’s computer and generates a unique client ID. Thereafter, if the user visits the advertised website, the stored cookie information gets accessed by the DoubleClick server, thereby recording the visit as a valid conversion. Because such a large percentage of web sites use Google advertising products as well as GA, this has the effect that the company knows a large fraction of users’ browsing history across many web sites, both popular sites and smaller “mom and pop” sites. In short, Google knows a lot about what you like, where you are, and what you buy. Google does provide ways to turn off features like targeted advertising and location tracking, as well as to delete the personalized profile associated with an account. However, these features are almost entirely opt-in, and most users either don’t know about them or just never bother to turn them off. Of course, just switching away from GA won’t eliminate all of these privacy issues (for example, it will do nothing to stop Android location tracking or search tracking), but it’s one way to reduce the huge amount of data Google collects. In addition, for site owners that use a GA alternative, Google does not get a behind-the-scenes look at the site’s traffic patterns — data which it could conceivably use in the future to build a competing tool.
A paywall may be protecting this write up. Nevertheless, if the information in the passage quoted above is accurate, Google’s senior management may have to do some explaining as the company executes some “Dancing with the Stars” footwork if regulators decide to dig into such assertions.
And the bloodhound, “Who me?” Woof.
Stephen E Arnold, June 18, 2020
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