As has been discussed over the course of this class, online advertising has shown to be very profitable for search engines basing the advertisements shown to keywords. Keyword-based advertising is a win-win for the search companies and the advertisers; because people are seeing results that are customized to what they are looking for, the ads are more likely to be clicked on and let to the advertiser’s web page, and thus these advertisers are more willing to pay for popular key words. It would also seem that the user could be alright with this paradigm; they see ads that are more relevant. However, the user has not really been given a choice as to whether or not they want their actions influencing the ads they see, and this is raising some big concerns with individual privacy.

However, keyword search may only be the beginning in customizing to individuals in order to turn a bigger profit. “The information collected by many Web sites — browsing histories, search histories, wish lists, preferences, purchase histories — is amassed and manipulated in ways consumers never know about.” (New York Times) The result is that a large repository of information is being collected that tells much about how each individual acts and is considered an invasion of privacy to many.

One solution that has been suggested is grant ownership of consumer-related information to the people, and let them decide whether or not they wish to share their information with marketers. In her blog Identity Woman, a woman named Kaliya, who describes herself as “saving the world with user-centric identity.” Should individuals have the right to hold private what can be easily collected on the web and manipulated in order to be more profitable? I think that there will not be enough of a call for privacy until enough people believe that their clickstream data is their own, and not the property of those who collect it.