SP1 drops, iPlayer falls over and Phorm is less than legal On Friday the BBC's iPlayer went down because of a back-end database failure. It has since come back online, but the Beeb nevertheless earned your scorn: The irony is that while they are doing all they can to stop the likes of me from using an illicit method to get the programmes, if they produced a Linux version, with the 30 …
Once Phorm collect your data, it's open to be 'subpoenaed' for use in a court case. Even if the data is anonymous or you have opted out, as long as the cookie on your machine can be tied to the data (which surely it must be able to be), the police (or someone else) can get your data.
Unless I'm misunderstanding things of course...
Of course the .GOV wants Phorm; BigBrother needs to know what you're looking at without having all the hassles of asking a judge for a wiretap, either before or during the investigation. Phorm data will be available after the event, and for up to 5 years, if other records-keeping laws are anything to go by.
Actually, this is the one place where phorm's comments are re-assuring.
They claim that all they store is the digest of the data. I.e. they can tell the police that you like motorbikes, but not which sites they gleaned that info from.
The only place (from what they are saying) that the data is available, is live.
But that's still too much for me.
Here's an idea for people with websites. Once the IP address range of Phorm's servers is identified, add a RewriteRule in Apache's .htaccess file so that whatever page they request they just get a 404 (or even more fun, a porn page)
Of course this could be problematic if Phorm pass the page through their servers to the end-user, rather than making an extra request; if that's the case then how about we add a banner to each page served through Phorm warning the visitor that they're being spied on, with a link to an explanation?
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