Charter Halts NebuAd Trial

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June 24, 2008

Congressional involvement seems to have helped Charter along in its decision to drop a controversial user profiling service. You may remember NebuAd from a string of entries here last month (see “Previously,” below). The company makes its money by pushing ads based on behavioral data it skims from Internet users via little black boxes installed at partner ISPs.

“NebuAd pays the ISP to be able to eavesdrop on customers’ surfing in order to build profiles that can be used to serve targeted advertising on third-party websites.

“But citing customer feedback from the notifications sent to the trial areas, Charter decided not to test the technology right now, the company announced Tuesday.

“But a spokeswoman emphasized that Charter wasn’t finished with the idea of tapping into the online advertising market, something that cable companies have traditionally done with television.

“We are not moving forward with the pilots at this time. We will continue to take a thoughtful, deliberate approach with the goal to ultimately structure an advertising service that enhances the internet experience for our customers and addresses questions and concerns they’ve raised.”

NebuAd has gone to Washington to make the case that its user surveillance technology isn’t particularly dangerous or unusual for the ad industry, so I’d take Charter’s statement to mean “once NebuAd can assure us that it won’t be attracting any more unwanted attention from people besides our outraged customers, we’ll get right back down to business.”

(Link)

Previously