EzinePrivacy.org

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What is an ezine?

How do ezines track us?

What are the Core Principles Ezine Privacy?

What about ezine privacy statements?

Who are the Ezine Privacy Violators?

What can individuals do?

How can I alert you to abuse?

What can ezine publishers do?

How do I get the Ezine Privacy button?

What are the Best Practices of Ezine Management?

What other resources are available?

Who are we?

How can I contact you?

Where is the Site Map?

What About Ezine Privacy Statements?

Privacy Statements

There are two privacy statements we've looked at:

1. The privacy statements of the ezine services, and
    
2. The privacy statements of the actual ezines.

Ezine Services

Many ezines are administered by online services. As part of our research we looked at their privacy statements. Here are a few:

ConstantContact

from www.constantcontact.com/privacy_guarantee.jsp

When we send you emails, we may include a single-pixel GIF to allow us to determine the number of people who open our emails. When you click on a link in an email, we record this individual response to allow us to customize our offerings to you.

Notice that they disclose they use web bugs. But they don't really tell you everything it means.

EmailROI

from www.emailroi.com/privacy.htm

emailROI utilizes Cookie technology for purposes of web site traffic analysis such as the time/date of the visit, the time/date of last visit, the page viewed, the referrer, transaction information for eCommerce pages, and other data. emailROI tracks click behavior in the e-mails it sends out. This data is used to update specific user-profile information, ascertain the areas of most interest to opt-in e-mail recipients, and to personalize e-mail messages to them.

This one seems to give more information. But in some ways, it is less useful. If you understand technospeak, you might understand. But most people we asked didn't understand.

CoolerEmail

from www.cooleremail.com/aboutus_privacy.shtml

CoolerEmail utilizes Cookie technology for purposes of web site traffic analysis such as the time/date of the visit, the time/date of last visit, the page viewed, the referrer, transaction information for eCommerce pages, and other data. CoolerEmail tracks click behavior in the e-mails it sends out. This data is used to update specific user-profile information, ascertain the areas of most interest to opt-in e-mail recipients, and to personalize e-mail messages to them.

Note that CoolerEmail uses almost exactly the same words as EmailROI. We believe that this is because CoolerEmail and EmailROI are somehow related.

Could You Understand?

Did these privacy statements make sense to you? They don't make sense to most people. But keep reading, we'll explain more.

Actual Ezines

What about the privacy statements of actual ezines? Consider these two examples:

PopArt

from www.popart.com/privacy.html

CoolerEmail, a third-party application service provider, provides our email newsletter subscription service. When you subscribe to a Pop ArtŪ newsletter, we transmit your email address to a database hosted by CoolerEmail. CoolerEmail does not use any personal information that is collected by Pop Art for any purpose other than to provide distribution of Pop Art email newsletters.

Note that it doesn't say anything about tracking you.

VIPLineup

from www.viplineup.com/subscription1.html

watch out for an email from our list administrator: "support@cooleremail.com,"

from www.viplineup.com/Privacy_Policy.html

The information that you provide THE LINEUP is strictly confidential. No one likes these forms, but your cooperation enables the compilation of statistics that help select the most relevant event listings, gain exclusive subscriber privileges, negotiate group discounts, and increase the quality of THE LINEUP. Age Range and Income Range are not mandatory, but when requested, your input in these and other categories will help tremendously. Your individual information will never be released to anyone without your explicit permission.

Although they use CoolerEmail, not one word about email tracking.

Summary of Privacy Statements

We aren't really picking on these providers or the ezines. These are just the examples we chose. None of the privacy policies really gave the information we think they should.

Our point is that most ezine privacy policies don't tell anything close to the whole story. And while the ezine services do a better job of disclosure, they tell it with words most people won't understand.

So, you ask ... what should the privacy policies say?

Here is an example that people could actually understand.

A Sample Privacy Statement

This is just a sample. No one really uses this. But if they did, people would really understand what is happening.

We track click behavior in the HTML e-mails we send out. This means that, if you elect to receive HTML email, we will:

a) Track if, and when, you open the email, and keep a permanent record of each open you make;

b) Whenever you forward the email, track every time anyone opens it, and keep a permanent record of that too;

c) Track if, and when, you click on any of the embedded links in the email, and keep a permanent record of each of these clicks;

d) Whenever you forward the email, track every time anyone clicks on any of the embedded links in the email, and keep a permanent record of each of these clicks too;

e) Keep this information permanently associated with your individual, personal data profile, along with your email address and any other personally identifiable information you may have supplied;

f) Use this personal history of opens and clicks to customize whether we send you emails, as well as the content of emails we send to you;

g) Create complete online tracking reports to permit us to view, any time we want, all the information we have about you, including when you've opened every email we sent, when you clicked on any link, how long you spent on the pages you went to, and the path of clicks you took on that "session" through our website.

Note that this individual tracking requires the use of HTML email and that none of this individual tracking is available to us if you choose to receive only plain text email.

Why Doesn't Anyone Say That?

Because it's true?

Last updated:
16:58, Wed, 11.Oct.2006