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back to article Qualcomm buys into Phorm-alike firm

The ad-fatigued may groan at the news that Qualcomm has splashed out $32m on data-gathering outfit Xiam. The Irish company specialises in analysing the habits of mobile phone users in order to target advertising at them, and has customers including Orange UK. Targeted advertising is all the rage these days, but the ways in …

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  1. Matt
    Paris Hilton

    Orange too!!!!

    I thought that I had managed to dodge the profiling bullet, looks like I need to find a new network now.

    I wonder if orange are opt-in or opt-out?

    PH, because even she can figure out people don't want this.

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  2. Alex
    Alert

    I had a dream last night

    that the general public wised up to this "ISP Internet Takeover" stunt and everyone:

    set their wireless access points open,

    installed cookie modifying firmware on the router

    and enabled local node file sharing server facilitys,

    the wireless access would auto-hop between access points (and ISP's), set to hop every few minutes, and log-on was all managed seamlessly by a piece of software not unlike "devicescape"...

    needless to say all adverts were blocked at the access points and the ISP's stunt left them hated by their subscriber base as they clawed for the last remaining "exploitable ignorant".

    ...t'was all most strange, but it worked.

    Internet Service Providers NOT Advertisement Service Providers

    DO. NOT. WANT.

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  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Thank God...

    ... I left Orange then. B()!*#)(*!)#@s.

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  4. Florence Stanfield
    Thumb Down

    Contract ends end of March just in time

    Well Time to look around found this just in time since contract is almost up last month so wil cancel now and look to sign up with another mobile network.

    Thanks Orange for a service that didn't last as long as I had planned but you blew it..

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  5. Mike Crawshaw
    Stop

    Orange's "Targeted" Advertising...

    I keep getting calls from Orange, trying to get me to upgrade my phone with them, as I'm near the end of my contractual period.

    Unfortunately, I don't actually _HAVE_ an Orange phone, nor have I ever had one. My mobile number (that they call me on) is O2, has always been O2, and has an O2 prefix. Trying to get the person on the other end of the phone to understand this is often an excercise in utter futility, because they usually don't speak any English apart from what's on the screen in front of them, and sentences like "This is not an Orange phone" seem to be too complex....

    If this is how Orange "target" their advertising on their established business, gods help any Orange broadband users* once this starts!!

    *or, more accurately, any Freeserve customers who were sold to Wanadoo, who were then bought by Orange. Yeesh.

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  6. Ash

    O2

    I might stick with them after all. I was planning on ditching them, but if Orange (the only real contender for consumer usage plans) decide to sell usage data to an advertising firm, they can stick it.

    Orange Wednesday or not!

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  7. William Morton
    Go

    The PHORM petition also covers other technologies like this

    The petition to Gordon Brown on http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/ispphorm/ refers to techonlogies of this kind. Add your name and lets stamp these tw@s into the ground

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  8. Chris Cheale

    Orange -> O2

    Something funny going on there as I, and a work colleague, both on Orange get calls from O2 offering a cheaper monthly subscription - despite us both being on PAYG and never having been with O2.

    Looks like these two companies are sharing data of some sort.

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  9. Anonymous Coward
    Joke

    @ Orange -> O2

    There is a big database out there of everyone's mobile number. Tele-sales just start at the top and keep going.

    It is such a convenient service. Upgrade your contract over the phone. They just need you to confirm some personal details. If they say it quickly enough, you may not hear which network they are trying to transfer you to.

    I always say that they must already have all the details they need if they are offering me a free phone and, just before I put the phone down, I say that I look forward to receiving my free phone in the post.

    I have been offered so many free phones and not one of them has arrived.

    That is false advertising, that is.

    No one gives out personal information over the phone, do they?

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