This paper is about cookies, the piece of text a Web site uses to maintain state, and how they are used to provide information about individual Web users.

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Final Project

Cookies, DoubleClick, and Data, Knowledge, and Information

Maryian Michail

MGT 773 ST -- Data Management

Dr. Sack

April 2002

Introduction

This paper is about cookies, the piece of text a Web site uses to maintain state, and how they are used to provide information about individual Web users.  While many Web users believe they can surf with anonymity, cookies can be used to gain knowledge of the user’s identity and to build a profile of that user based upon the sites and pages that user has accessed.

Combing a cookie with personal information about the user can be used to track and monitor that user’s activities on the Web.  That information can be aggregated with other individuals with similar interests to form databases that can be sorted to develop lists of individuals based upon personal interests, demographics, or lifestyle.

This paper examines how an advertising firm, DoubleClick and its Abacus subsidiary, combine personal knowledge of the individual with the data stored in cookies to create profiles based on Web sites surfing history and sell that data to marketing and other organizations.  The Davenport and updated information continuum models and knowledge formulation theories are applied to understand the relationship between data, knowledge, and information within firms that purchase DoubleClick’s data.

A Primer on Cookies

A "cookie" is a small piece of text sent by a Web server to a Web browser to be read back from that browser. Cookies are necessary because HTTP is stateless; each request-response interaction requires a new connection between the client and server.  Cookies are a way to have the browser "remember" information that is needed to maintain continuity during a browser-server dialog.

There are two types of cookies. The key difference between them is the time of expiration.  They are:

  • Session cookies; cookies they expire at the end of the session.
  • Persistent cookies; cookies that do not expire at the end of the session.

A session cookie exists for the duration of the user’s visit.  They are usually inaccessible after the session is inactive for a specified period of time or the user leaves the site.

A persistent cookie is used to store a user’s preferences for use by a single Web site. It’s stored on the hard drive and is read by the browser each time the user (or any user of that computer) visits the Web site that sent the cookie.  Persistent cookies can be used for a variety of purposes, including:

  • Personalization

For example, if a user supplies personal information, such as an e-mail address, MSNBC will allow that user to select the specific information, such as sport scores or stock quotes, he or she would like to see when visiting the site.  This is made possible by a cookie, the cookie contains a database key, and whenever the user visits MSNBC it will use it to retrieve a record of the user’s preferences and to assemble and deliver personalized content.  This type of cookie may have a life span of several years

  • On-line Retailing

Within a brick-and-mortar shop consumers wander around, select their purchases, and bring them to the checkout.  Without cookies it would be impossible to emulate this experience on a retail Web site.  Customers would have to browse through the catalog, write down what they want, and then transcribe that information to a form.  By using cookies items selected while browsing are “remembered” and displayed on the checkout page.  Most retail sites use short duration persistent cookies that expire from one to twenty-four hours.

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  • Targeted Advertising

Companies that advertise on Web sites want to know if their advertising is successful.  They can perform a click stream analysis; for example, Godiva Chocolate’s Webmaster can periodically examine their logs and determine the number of referrals from say, CNN.  Or Godiva’s CNN advertisement could implement a cookie and receive data, immediately, about visits to their site.

To take this one step further, companies can hire an advertising firm, such as DoubleClick to deploy their advertising.  If a user goes to any of the thousands of sites with a DoubleClick deployed ad, DoubleClick will also implement ...

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