Suit alleges Disney, other top sites spied on users

Source: CNET

A lawsuit filed in federal court last week alleges that a group of well-known Web sites, including those owned by Disney, Warner Bros. Records, and Demand Media, broke the law by covertly tracking the Web movements of their users, including children.

Attorneys representing a group of minors and their parents filed the suit Tuesday in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California, records show. The suit alleges that Clearspring Technologies, a software company that creates widgets and also offers a way to serve ads via widgets, is at the center of the wrongdoing.

Web site operators such as Disney, Playlist.com, and SodaHead are "Clearspring Flash Cookie Affiliates," the plaintiffs allege in their suit. Clearspring set "Flash cookies on (affiliate site) users' computers...online tracking device(s) which would allow access to and disclosure of Internet users' online activities."

The Web sites working with Clearspring knew users weren't just tracked at sites owned by affiliates, but were followed without their knowledge wherever they went online, the defendants wrote in their suit.

Read more: http://news.cnet.com/8301-31001_3-20013672-261.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20

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Uncensored Activist News http://activistnews.blogspot.com

Although I think it is wrong, and a reason for something as important as information exchange to be monitored by civilian oversight, and not controlled by a few companies.

one step from total computer illiteracy however I am curious.

You can usually get to it via right-clicking your mouse on a web page. It's not supposed to be "visible" to users.

ANY entertainment-oriented site has to pay the bills somehow, and if they don't do it with subscriptions (or voluntary donations, like DU) then they have to do it with ad clickthroughs where people buy stuff, or by selling an aggregate of tracking information to someone else.

It's folly to think that you get something for nothing on the Internet. Every form of 'free' entertainment has a cost, unless you're savvy enough to protect yourself from it. Even if you don't want to do that, or don't know how, then simply develop some sales resistance, and stop acting like the typical mindless consumer that those who buy data think you are.

Actually, almost every site tracks people, in some way. What seems to be alleged here is that non-scrubbed data on specific users is being sold without the user's consent.

Where's the popcorn?

This one I'm going to enjoy.

n/t