The Privacy Foundation has released free software that enables
users to detect when a web site or e-mail contains a web bug. Web
bugs are barely visible tracking tags that are often used by
marketers to monitor consumer habits on-line. The software will
only work with Microsoft’s Internet Explorer browser, and can be
downloaded from the Bugnosis web site.
An increasing number of web sites and marketers are adopting web
bugs to store information about surfing preferences. The Bugnosis
software detects the bugs on a web site and casts a blinking bug on
the page to notify visitors. A user can also set the browser to
utter the “uh-oh” sound when a bug is detected.
The Privacy Foundations Richard Smith wrote on his privacy tip
sheet that:
“Our goal with the software is to reveal how
web bugs are tracking all of us on the Internet and to get
companies to ‘fess up’ about why they are using them. I've been
bothered over the past 18 months by the fact that most sites that
use web bugs don't disclose that fact. Any company that uses web
bugs on their site should say so clearly in their privacy policies
and explain the following: why they are being used, what data is
sent by a bug, who gets the data, and what they are doing with it.
If a company is reluctant to talk about web bugs, then they
shouldn't be using them.”
