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Natalie Danner
Mrs. Martin
ENGLI 1102
25 April 2019
A New Age of Advertising

It is projected that the United States will spend close to 200 billion dollars on

advertisement alone. With technology improving, the way companies target their consumers with

ads is improving as well, but with this selective marketing strategy comes a privacy concern

resulting from data mining. The news Article "Walgreens Tests Digital Cooler Doors With

Cameras to Target You With Ads" published by the Wall Street Journal, shines a light on this

concern. This company is called Cooler Screens Inc. implemented technology of having cameras

and sensors in bedded into the cooler doors of Walgreens' drink section and those cameras will

scan your appearance and decide what beverages to market towards you. They will base their

decision on age, gender, and other physical features. This technology will also send feedback and

data analytics back to the store to provide information to later help improve their marketing

strategies. The use of technology to market towards consumers without direct consent should not

be legal. Policies that limit the company's data and ensure straightforward consent from their

potential consumers.

In advertisements, there are two main courses companies follow are targeted and non-

targeted marketing. A non-targeted marketing strategy will not use data mining to decide whom

to advertise to, this is strategies such as billboards along roadsides and posters seen in malls. The

companies with paying for this advertising is doing it, all while knowing there is not a certain

audience guaranteed to view their ad. The other marketing strategy is targeted based

advertisement. In the journal Personally Relevant Online Advertisements: Effects of

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Demographic Targeting on Visual Attention and Brand Evaluation it is stated, "This

"demographic targeting" focuses on the demographic properties of the users–such as gender, age,

or place of residence–in order to tailor the ad content to the target group" This type of advertising

that is more popular with our advancing technology. This marketing strategy that comes from

data mining is directly threating any consumers privacy. To obtain information, there are three

basic ways this is done; online tracking, purchase behavior, and surveillance. The journal, The

Death of Privacy There is new technology being developed to receive information on consumers

states, "…the private sector find it valuable to conduct various forms of surveillance or to "mine"

data collected by others" This goes to shows we are directly being invading through data mining

by companies working to better their marketing strategies through compromising their

consumers private information.

The act of online tracking is the most popular method of obtaining information that

companies use. When a web user does a search, either on a search engine or something to the

extent of searching an Instagram page, these searches are being stored for later use. This is done

through something called cookies. According to Norton by Symantec a cookie is, "A packet of

data that a computer receives, then sends back without changing or altering it. No matter what

it's called, a computer cookie consists of information. When you visit a website, the website

sends the cookie to your computer. Your computer stores it in a file located inside your web

browser" When visiting a website where there are cookies being used they have a pop-up that

usually says "We inform you that this site uses own, technical, and third parties' cookies to make

sure our web page is user-friendly and to guarantee a high functionality of the webpage. By

continuing to browse this website, you declare to accept the use of cookies" This pop-up used to

have the user hit a button to consent, but it is more typical now to have the message disappear
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once the user starts to interact with the webpage even if this means just scrolling up and/or down.

Without spontaneous consent webpages are now implementing, this form of consent is not direct

enough for the user to understand. The message appears as though accepting these terms will

only make the use of the website easier. When clicking on the privacy policy which appears as a

small link on the pop-up, it is clear there are many more layers than what the website got across.

Often these websites privacy policies state what information they include and what right they

now have to your information, but this is often hidden.

The most typical information collect is the users IP address, device type, name and ID,

the date and time of requests, the content of your requests, information on your browser version,

your screen resolution, and information on your operating system, including language settings.

Although all these things are invading our privacy and example to exemplify the unjustness of

this act is through discrimination in advertising. The article How Do Consumers' Cultural

Backgrounds and Values Influence Their Coupon Proneness? States, "Specifically, we suggest

that consumers' degree of interdependence predicts their motivation to pursue self-regulation,

which fosters the use of coupons" It is thought that people who originate from North America

and are more westernized are more interdependent than those from Asian based countries. This

creates a divide in whom companies choose to promote coupons to base on cultural backgrounds.

This creates an unfair divide in who is getting ads based on factors consumers have no control in

and not necessarily their preferences. This information is often then sent to third-parties. The

journal article Advertising Gets Personal states, "Internet service providers, Web sites, and

advertising networks sell this data to other companies, including data aggregators" This is the

most common way companies obtain information and the way most consumers are affected. To

receive this information a third-party will purchase this data to later implement it into their
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advertising. According to the article Why Am I Seeing This Ad? The Effect of Ad Transparency

on Ad Effectiveness "Facebook purchased data on 70 million US households, enabling the firm

to tailor ads based on users' purchases" Without the right policies put into place this allows

Google to legally breach over 70 million person data. This is the most common way companies

obtain information, but it is not the only way.

The second most popular way companies are receiving their data to later use to advertise

is through tracking purchase behavior. A story that greatly demonstrates this way told in the

earlier mention article, Why Am I Seeing This Ad? The Effect of Ad Transparency on Ad

Effectiveness. In 2012 Target Inc. used purchase behavior technology to obtain the information

that fifteen-year-old girl from Minnesota made over twenty-five purchases that were all

pregnancy related. This led the Target marketing strategist to mail pregnancy-related coupons

addressed to the teen. Her father who saw these coupons went into their local target complaining

to management about the "inappropriate" coupons sent to his daughter. When the Target store

called the upset father a few days after the incident. He revealed that his daughter was, in fact,

pregnant and apologized to the store. Although under unfortunate circumstances this goes to

show how heavily companies rely on purchase behavior to decide who and what they will target

ads to in the future. The way companies can track is through uniquely created customer ID

codes. This easily done through online transaction due to the stored data of purchases through the

website, but it is also achieved in brick and mortar stores. During the purchasing or checking out

process the consumer is often asked questions such as to provide their email, phone number, or

rewards number. All of these seem to benefit the customer because they are expected

promotional ads sent to everyone or reward points to later be used. All of these are typical but

the more hidden and invasive reason is to keep track of everything purchased through that phone
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number, email, etc. This act is done out similar through credit cards for that specific company

such as Targets ‘Red Card' which with every swipe, the company is keeping a file of what your

typical purchases look alike. This information is fed into an algorithm to decide what products to

advertise to you. Purchase made by consumers can be very personal and things someone might

want to keep private. This use of advertising is more invasive than the previous due to the fact

the consumer gives no consent in brick and mortar stores. This is not the only marketing

strategies that invade a consumer's privacy without their consent.

Companies have been tracking consumers through internet use and recent purchases

based on receipts and unique customer IDs. Now with video, there is nowhere a consumer's

choices are not being monitored. This also is a bigger invasion of privacy due to the video

recording and actual footage being stored and not just data. When discussing the matter of

surveillance use in marketing strategies, it is important to note that this is not the same

surveillance used for security purposes. In the surveillance cameras used to market, there is a

facial recognition technology in these cameras to detect most of the time. According to the article

Market Basket Analysis from Egocentric Videos" Visual and audio data can be collected and

processed to monitor pauses, understanding areas of interest for customers, estimating the path

speed, giving alert due to busy areas of the sale point, as well as manage the inefficiencies" This

marketing strategy is seen in the news article about Walgreens installing digital coolers. With

technology advancing this is the way we are headed, more privacy-invasive marketing strategies.

The consent in this type of information retrieval is non-existent. When in a store it is considered

‘spontaneous consent' when you enter through the front doors. The store does not even need a

sign legally to use video cameras to market, but they do need to legally state if they are
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videotaping for security purposes. The use of surveillance to receive information is more

invasive, therefore the need for consent or warning is more necessary.

Many of the arguments that favor of invading consumers privacy stem from the

companies doing the advertising. Some of these arguments are; new customer recruitment,

profitable marketing strategies, more accurate forecasting. Many of the "positive" outcomes that

people argue come from data-mining are most beneficial to the companies advertising and not

the consumer. The benefits of data-mining and obtaining a consumer's personal information lead

to companies finding the most compatible audience to advertise to. This will help the company

avoid spending money in marketing towards unlikely customers as well as help them sell more.

Though this is beneficial for the company, it costs the average citizen their privacy. When

something is working in a company favor even though it is unethical, then said the company will

try to defend their position by claiming their behavior benefits them in ways that are not

monetary. The companies claim it helps their strategies which ultimately saves them money by

not spending on advertisements going to consumers who are not interested. It also makes them

more money by making sure their target audience is getting the advertisement which means they

are more likely to purchase their service or good. This is a problem due to the consumer often

not being aware of their information data being sold and used again to benefit another company.

For the consumers who do not have an issue with their information being stored, there is

a philosophical problem to this. First, companies should do what is good for the masses. The

majority of people have an issue with their information being breached without consent. The

discussion of artificial intelligence (A.I.) brings up the discussion of calculative and meditative

thinking. According to Privacy In America, "Considerable progress has been made in

programming computers to think like human beings by using ultra-sophisticated software. This
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software – commonly knowing as ‘artificial intelligence' (AI) – will be in widespread

commercial use within the next decade" Meditative or critical thinking is the process of

questioning assumptions on contemplating the meaning of things. Calculative thinking is

constant and does not stop to collect itself. This is where the world is heading with technology

improving. This is the problem with algorithms and assumptions that many companies do when

marketing. An example would be Netflix; after processing what type of movies you have

watched lately, they will put you into a group and suggest a movie that they believe you would

watch based on previous behavior. This is how all these marketing strategies work especially the

purchase behavior tracking. This leads to companies doing the thinking for us which can be a

danger to where the world is heading when we give companies and their computers the ability to

decide for us and we follow their suggestions. It leads to control and devaluing humans. This

ultimately leads to the consumer not being able to see new companies or products they might

benefit from due to them not previously being engaged with a similar product. This also does not

allow smaller companies to advertise due to not having the money possible to purchase the

things necessary for these marketing strategies.

The allowance of these marketing strategies without a policy change can lead to a

dangerous future of advertising. Brandon Fischer predicts that half of Americans will receive an

implant within the next twenty years they track their behavior and opinions when shopping and

feeds this information back to the store. "His [Brandon Fisher] argument was a blunt, optimistic

case for biometric monitoring in stores. And just as the frog-invoking executive, no one in the

room protested" (Turow 2). Another possible concern is stated in The Privacy Advocates "The

Mark of the Beast has been seen in more conventional forms of national identification, such as

the Real ID proposals in the United States. Permeant forms of citizen identification…" Without
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policies being put into placed and enforced then the invasion will only grow. Advertisement is

effective strategy companies should and will continue to use. The problem is the consent and

lack of privacy consumers now have. Laws need to be put into place that makes it illegal for

companies to obtain and store information about a consumer without their consent. Within their

consent statement, the company must disclose all information being obtained and where this

information will be going and for what use. Also, the ability for consumers to know where their

information is and what information is stored and give them the right to chose to revoke the

companies right of their information. With these policies put into place, this removes the power

the companies have over their consumers. This will allow more equal distribution of

advertisement which will benefit the masses. The policies will also stop the spread of privacy-

invading technologies due to their use not being legal and unethical.
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Work Cited

Bennett, Colin J. The Privacy Advocates: Resisting the Spread of Surveillance. MIT Press, 2010.

Froomkin, A, Michael, "The Death of Privacy?" Stanford Law Review, May 2000, p. 1461.

Academic OneFile

Greengard, Samuel. "Advertising Gets Personal." Communications of the ACM, vol. 55, no. 8,

2012, p. 18., doi:10.1145/2240236.2240243.

Kaspar, Kai, et al. "Personally Relevant Online Advertisments: Effects of Demographic

Targeting on Visual Attention and Brand Evaluation." Plos One, vol. 14. no. 2, 2019

Kim, Tami, et al. "Why Am I Seeing This Ad? The Effect of Ad Transparency on Ad

Effectiveness." Journal of Consumer Research, vol. 45, no. 5, 2018, pp. 906–932.

Lalwani, Ashok K, and Jessie J Wang. "How Do Consumers' Cultural Backgrounds and Values

Influence Their Coupon Proneness? A Multimethod Investigation." Journal of Consumer

Research, vol. 45, no. 5, 2018, pp. 1037–1050., doi:10.1093/jcr/ucy033.

Linowes, David F. Privacy in America: Is Your Private Life in the Public Eye? Univerity of

Illinois Press, 1989.

Santarcangelo, Vito, et al. "Market Basket Analysis from Egocentric Videos." Pattern

Recognition Letters, vol. 112, 2018, pp. 83–90., doi:10.1016/j.patrec.2018.06.010.

Turow, Joseph. AISLES HAVE EYES: How Retailers Track Your Shopping, Strip Your

Privacy, and Define Your Power. YALE UNIV PRESS, 2018.

"What Are Cookies?" What Are Cookies?, us.norton.com/internetsecurity-how-to-what-are-

cookies.html.
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"Advertising Spending in the U.S. 2019 | Statistic." Statista.

www.statista.com/statistic/236958/advertising-spending-in-the-us/.