Brian Wiechowski
Director of Business Development, Mobile Solutions | TRUSTe
@bcwiechowski

The “Year of Mobile” is finally here!  The advertising industry has been predicting this milestone for what seems like the last decade – but I truly think this prognostication could prove correct in 2013.  Given the one billion (and growing) smart phones and tablets worldwide (and remarkably high number of hours users spend on these devices) – the potential is certainly there like it’s never been before.  Couple the reach with the emerging and increasingly sophisticated geographic, contextual and behavioral targeting capabilities – and marketers surely will want to allocate budgets to reach those audiences.

But before we place any bets in Las Vegas, let’s consider the three big reasons for hesitation by advertisers: attribution, efficacy and privacy.  Remember that the desktop display advertising industry is nearly 20 years old – and so are the performance and attribution measures, tracking mechanisms and many of the privacy controls like third party cookie clearing.  By contrast, mobile advertising is only about five or six (if we consider the launch of the iPhone in 2007) – and those same standards are not universal, particularly given the Apps vs. Web divide, multiple operating systems and myriad of devices.  Mobile clearly has some catching up to do.

Given this gap, the TRUSTe team made a strategic decision to do what we do best: analyze the regulatory, business and technology privacy challenges of mobile ads, and then work with leading industry players to build and deploy a mobile solution that will benefit both consumers and the companies who serve them.  After building and quickly scaling the AdChoices program for desktop browsers, we embarked on a mission a year and half ago to replicate the AdChoices program for mobile devices (TRUSTed Mobile Ads). TRUSTe provided additional support by launching the TRUSTed Data Certification, helping ad tech providers to build partner confidence and stay on the right side of regulators.  The core purpose of our technologies, as always, remains focused on transparency, choice and privacy by design.

Since the details are what matter in mobile, let’s take a quick look at the technology.  Smart phones and tablets are fundamentally different from the desktop web in how they track, identify and target users.  For example, the Apple mobile operating system (iOS) allows a number of unique identifiers for apps, and limits the use of third party cookies by having them turned off by default on their widely used Safari web browser.  The Google Android operating system allows the use of third party cookies for web, but faces the similar challenge to iOS with apps.  Also, the app and mobile web systems operate largely in isolation on each device – so a unified preference setting is difficult.  As such, TRUSTe works closely with leading mobile ad companies to determine both the constraints and needs of these devices that use apps and mobile web browsers.  Read the rest of this entry »

Danilo Labovic
EU Managing Director | TRUSTe
@dlabovic

TRUSTe and Promontory have launched a joint BCR Management Program designed to make it quicker, simpler and cheaper for businesses to prepare for compliance with the Binding Corporate Rules (BCRs) regime, apply for authorisation from their Data Protection Authority to use BCRs for international data transfers within their organisation, and self-certify their ongoing BCRs compliance through the Program.

BCRs are designed to allow multinational companies to transfer personal data from the European Economic Area (EEA) to their affiliates located outside of the EEA in compliance with Data Protection Directive 95/46/EC. The most utilised current alternative to BCRs is the use of the model contractual clauses approved by the European Commission. However, in multinational companies with complex structures, there are drawbacks where hundreds of contracts may be required to cover transfers between all affiliates, and keeping those contracts up to date can be difficult and time consuming.

TRUSTe will be delivering and managing the new TRUSTe-Promontory BCR Management Program, based on a framework developed by Promontory, a global regulatory compliance consulting firm. This new program is designed to offer organisations the combination of TRUSTe’s credibility and experience in developing privacy certification programs and Promontory’s experience of European data protection regulation and addressing corporate compliance around international data transfers. Read the rest of this entry »