MICROSOFT is moving

MICROSOFT is moving to protect consumer privacy and advertising and has called on the internet industry to support it.

MICROSOFT is moving to protect consumer privacy in web search and advertising and has called on the internet industry to support it.

"We think it's time for an industry-wide dialogue," Peter Cullen, Microsoft's chief privacy officer, said in an interview. "The current patchwork of protections and how companies explain them is really confusing to consumers."

Specifically, Microsoft said it would make all web search query data anonymous after eighteen months on its "Live Search" service, unless it receives user consent to store it longer.

Microsoft planned to store customer search data separately, email addresses or phone numbers and take steps to ensure no unauthorized correlation of these types of data could be made. It would also permanently remove "cookie" user identification data.

"Microsoft is going to do a more thorough scrub of customer data once it is too old," said Peter Swire, a law professor at Ohio State University who served as US privacy czar in the 1990s. "Previously, the practice was to do a partial scrub."

As part of Microsoft's push, Ask.com, the web search business of Barry Diller's IAC/InterActiveCorp, has agreed to join Microsoft in calling on the industry to adopt a common set of privacy practices for data collection, commercial use and consumer protection in search and online advertising.

Microsoft's initiatives follow recent moves by Google, concerned at how rapid advances in search technology may pose unprecedented threats to consumer privacy.

Google set in motion industry efforts to limit how long web search data is stored by being first to say it will in the future cleanse personal information from its databases after 18 months. Microsoft is one-upping Google by making its move retroactive.
Google has stepped up its own efforts to reach compromises with European Union and US policy-makers in recent months.

Microsoft said it was taking new steps to notify users how technologies affected them, giving users more specific controls over their privacy and setting tighter limits on how long it kept search data.

Both Google and Microsoft have faced scrutiny from US and European regulators over their plans to merge with major players in the online advertising industry.

Google is seeking approval to buy advertising services firm DoubleClick for $US3.1 billion ($3.5 billion) , a move analysts said would more than double the number of web users to whom it serves up online ads. Similarly, Microsoft plans to buy diversified ad services company aQuantive, a DoubleClick rival, for $US6 billion. A shareholder meeting to approve the deal is set for August.

The DoubleClick deal, in particular, faces congressional hearings over the potential privacy issues that could arise from the concentration of data about consumer web-surfing habits, buying behavior and advertising data.