Collusion – tracking your data across the internet
Collusion is a fascinating tool created by Atul Varma that keeps track of how the websites you visit send information about you to other websites. It is an add-on to the popular Mozilla Firefox internet browser, and once the add-on is started, it gradually adds nodes to an interactive web as you surf the internet, connecting and creating nodes when the website you visit sends information to a third-party or another website. Usually the data sent is used for advertising purposes; however, due to the fact that internet users are given no indication of when and where their data is being sent (which is potentially illegal), there is a persistent fear that such routes may be exploited for the purpose of scamming users and illegal acts of digital terrorism.
Behavioral targeting and tracking is a proliferating, and now multi-billion dollar, industry that started its boom following the start of widespread internet advertising. The working philosophy behind gathering all this data is that advertisements that cater to a user’s interests are more likely to be clicked on and followed through than randomly selected advertisements, leading to potential increased revenues and page visits. This is related to the advertising tied to search behavior market we discussed in Networks (Chapter 15.1). The methodologies differ though, and the clear disadvantage of the advertising networks we discussed are that the website can only track your information while you do your browsing within their webpages, leading to possibly assumptions on user preferences and interests.
Rather than relying on just the results of search engine queries and resulting links clicked, third-parties that behaviorally track your internet usage keep a running total of all the websites you’ve visited in the past, as well as how long you stayed on particular pages and any links followed on those pages. This presents an even greater opportunity for savings than normal advertising networks. While this serves to increase the chance that advertisements may be paid attention to, the vast majority of this information aggregation is done so without the knowledge of the user at hand. I was surprised to find that after an hour of my own internet surfing, my collusion diagram had become an extremely dense network of hundreds of lines and nodes, among which only a dozen or so nodes were websites I actually visited. I was also surprised to find just how many of these trackers were somehow connected to all the websites I visited on a daily basis.
The fears and privacy concerns discussed earlier become relevant when people realize just how many of the websites they visit are linked to parties that want their information. For the most part, users are protective of their privacy, and advertisers and publishers assure users that they do not store any personal information and data. The scare is that most times, the sheer quantity of “anonymous” data accumulated on your browsing habits is enough to identify who is who (for instance, this example from a few years back).
However true or close at hand these fears may be, for now this tool is an excellent way for the typical internet user to monitor how the websites he/she visits use their browsing information. The add-on graphically depicts websites and third-party organizations as they are sent information on how you browse the internet, giving users the opportunity to selectively block unknown or untrustworthy trackers (using other add-ons or extensions such as TrackerBlock).
Official Website (and Firefox add-on)
TEDtalk Gary Kovacs: Tracking the trackers