Printed from www.pcpro.co.uk
Posted on July 6th, 2009 by Barry Collins
Why BT might have finished off Phorm
For months we’ve been wondering who would be the first ISP to take the plunge with Phorm’s technology: now BT’s decision has helped push Phorm off the edge of the cliff.
Make no mistake: BT’s decision to drop Phorm is a cataclysmic blow for the advertising firm (as reflected by the sharp drop in its share price this morning). In one stroke, it’s lost the UK’s single biggest ISP and its closest ally.
Phorm’s three UK ISP partners – BT, Virgin Media and TalkTalk – have been playing a cowardly game of chicken over the past 18 months. The service has attracted so much negative publicity that all three have sat on the fence, hoping that one of the others would be brave enough to roll out the service, so they could judge just how much of a PR disaster it would be.
BT was the only one of the three to have completed a full public trial of Webwise and has long been the favourite to deploy first. Now, it’s decided it’s perfectly comfortable collecting splinters on the fence. “The interest-based advertising market is extremely dynamic and we intend to monitor Phorm’s progress with other ISPs and with Webwise Discover before finalising our plans,” the company claims.
The harsh truth is Phorm has made startlingly little progress with either of the other ISPs. Virgin has been repeatedly forced to deny stories that its interest in Phorm was waning over the past couple of months, while its customer service team has (unofficially, according to Virgin) been sending out letters reassuring worried customers that it has no plans to roll out Phorm.
TalkTalk, meanwhile, has just bought Tiscali and its associated ISPs, and faces months of complicated integration work ahead. A distraction like Phorm is the last thing it needs. Neither Virgin or TalkTalk have even tested Webwise with their customers, let alone committed to a rollout.
BT has also undermined Phorm’s chief selling point: that it’s a money-spinner for ISPs. “Given our public commitment to developing next-generation broadband and television services in the UK we have decided to weigh up the balance of resources devoted to other opportunities,” BT claims, suggesting that it views Phorm as a cost rather than a pot of gold. So much for the service that was going to help boost the finances of ISPs.
In short, despite a public relations onslaught and concerted attempts to convince everyone from ISPs, to politicians, to advertisers about the merits of its technology, Phorm seems no closer to rollout in the UK than it was 18 months ago, when it first arrived on these shores. In fact, its chances of success have never looked weaker.
Tags: BT, Phorm, TalkTalk, Virgin Media, Webwise
Posted in: Newsdesk
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8 Responses to “ Why BT might have finished off Phorm ”
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July 6th, 2009 at 3:46 pm
“Neither Virgin or BT have even tested Webwise with their customers, let alone committed to a rollout.”
Surely you mean “Neither Virgin or TalkTalk have even…”?
July 6th, 2009 at 4:32 pm
Indeed, you’re right. Now corrected.
Barry Collins
Online Editor
July 6th, 2009 at 6:12 pm
It is unbelievable in my opinion that BT ever got themselves in this mess. One of the most highly regarded telecommunications companies in the world getting involved with a company whose previous life as 121Media was associated with claimed spyware and rootkits. Not the sort of thing that you would expect from a company so highly regarded.
I think BT still will go through a long period of time where trust will remain low in the eyes of many others. Trust is gained over time. Once that trust is lost, it can be lost sometimes forever.
July 7th, 2009 at 12:19 am
BT deserve no praise for this decision, they were forced into it by public pressure. The public outcry, the work of the ‘privacy pirates’ from all over the web and the threat of prosecution made them think twice. Had the alarm not been raised they would have quite happily deployed this invasive,immoral system. On the subject of ‘partners’ let us not forget that this government . They were quite prepared to let this system go ahead,quoted the Phorm PR handbook whenever questions were asked and gave comfort and assistance to Phorm without a thought for the rights of the public
July 7th, 2009 at 12:56 pm
Good news that hopefully spells the end for Phorm in the UK.
But let us not forget that it is only through the hard work of dedicated private citizens that this issue was able to be faught. People have been labelled as Privacy Pirates, had a perfectly valid petition to the government completely ignored as falling under the remit of the toothless ICO, had to put up with Phorm launching a smear website naming and shaming those people brave enough to fight against their invasive technology.
The real losers in all this are BT, Virgin and TalkTalk for their complete failure to understand the moral grounds on which so many of their customer object to technology such as Phorm. They seem to have no respect for the privacy of their customers data and were all perfectly happy to let Phorm install kit within the boundaries of the ISP which should never be allowed to happen for advertising purposes. Non of these big three come out of this with a shred of honour or decency.
And worst of all is the British governments complete failure to protect its citizens, it is such a shame that it fell to Europe to pick up and fight our corner. New laws on online privacy are needed now to prevent this from ever happeneing again and it should be built around the following principles with regards to online advertising.
1) They should never be allowed access at the ISP level.
2) They must operate on an ‘Opt In’ basis.
3) There should be binding European wide governance and rules as to how Behavourial advertising companies should work, outside of the control of our own government whom cannot be trusted.
4) Unauthorised interception of online communications by ISP’s should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.
All imho of course
July 7th, 2009 at 1:12 pm
This is excellent news and a good analysis but until the use of DPI for marketing and advertising purposes is clearly made illegal and the CEOs of the gang of 3 all publicly disassociate themselves from Phorm then Phorm will keep spinning and blustering as only it can.
There is still a reckoning to be had: those responsible for BT’s secret testing of Phorm’s technology (which has still to be proven legal) must be bought to book in court. That must not be forgotten in the aftermath of this announcement.
Your use of the word “cowardly” is, in my view, very appropriate. None of BT, VM or TT deserve any credit – public pressure has forced BT to backtrack and the others must surely follow. They deserve condemnation for becoming involved with Phorm in the first place.
July 7th, 2009 at 4:56 pm
[...] pieces of analysis and those lacking in Clue and understanding. On the side of Excellence comes Barry Collins at PC Pro. Here’s a snippet: Make no mistake: BT’s decision to drop Phorm is a cataclysmic blow for [...]
July 16th, 2009 at 2:51 pm
This is a good decision. I was ready to cancel my BT Broadband if they considered offering this as anything other than an opt-in feature for customers.
I agree with Jamie’s sentiments. The issue of BT having covertly tested this system on unwitting customers needs to be addressed, even if the British government doesn’t give a toss about privacy.