Yahoo opens window on targeting adverts

Yahoo has launched a scheme in the UK to show visitors to its websites how their personal data are used to target advertising, the first such move by a large Internet publisher ahead of the introduction of new European online privacy rules.

A year after its launch in the US, Yahoo’s “Ad Choices” icon will be added to advertisements on pages where its users log in to services such as Yahoo Mail and Messenger, some of its highest-value banners. Clicking on the icon prompts more information about who placed the advertisement, why it was shown and links to manage user preferences about targeted “interest-based” advertising. Yahoo hopes the pilot scheme will improve public understanding of its advertising targeting system at the point where it is most relevant, rather than relying on a link to a privacy policy placed discreetly at the bottom of a web page.