Stalked by Kath & Kim: the ‘creepy’ tactics of tech titans

Adelaide Bracey searched Google for Kath & Kim: in days she was being stalked by t-shirt ads in an example of the ‘creepy’ tactics by tech titans.

Adelaide Bracey has been targeted by digital advertisers after searching online for travel trips, clothes or restaurants. Picture: Hollie Adams

A few weeks ago, Adelaide Bracey searched Google for the Aus­tralian sitcom Kath & Kim. Days later, her Instagram feed was inexplicably featuring ads for Kath & Kim T-shirts.

And then there was the time the 23-year-old spoke to a friend about saunas. “I didn’t Google it — and then it comes up as an ad on my Facebook. It’s ­really creepy,” Ms Bracey said.

Vegan handbags, cheap flights and restaurant meal deals have all followed on her social media ­accounts, run by the tech giants, for days after internet searches. “Every time I go on to my ­Facebook, there’s advertising everywhere,” she said. “What if I Google something that I don’t want other people to necessarily know about — or just Google something weird — and then it comes back up on my Facebook?”

It’s a question also raised by the Australian Competition & Consumer Commission, which has proposed changes to the Privacy Act to control how Google and Facebook track and trade user internet history to allow ­advertisers to chase people around social media.

Consumers would be told plainly how their information was being used and would have to “opt in’’ to have their data collected. Settings to allow data to be collected should be preselected to “off’’. ACCC chairman Rod Sims said customers might be less willing to inadvertently share their personal data if they were aware of how the information was used.

“The data collected from consumers using these platforms ­extends significantly beyond the data that users actively provide when using the digital platform services,’’ he said.

“There seems an understatement to consumers of the extent of data collection … and an overstatement to consumers of the level of control consumers have over their personal data use.’’

Ms Bracey said she was concerned about people knowing what she was searching via ­Google “and how they get the ­algorithms that create the ads’’.

“I type something in once or search for something and it follows me for the next few days, and sometimes it comes up even when you haven’t Googled it, but if I’ve spoken about it with a friend,” she said.

Ads for Kath & Kim T-shirts and vegan handbags that appeared on Adelaide Bracey’s social media feeds.

Ms Bracey, who lives in inner Sydney’s Darlinghurst, owns a children’s party business called Periwinkle Parties. The 23-year-old doesn’t have any children, yet she is bombarded with advertisements for early-learning centres and children’s schools.

Few consumers understand how the sophisticated tracking technology works or the level of digital stalking conducted by the ad trackers.

When a consumer goes into a website to buy a product, the site stores a cookie on their device. The cookie is a digital identifier that is unique to every customer. Digital marketing companies use ad trackers, which closely monitor the consumer’s behaviour, to follow the cookie across various sites and apps. Using the data, they can then push individually targeted ads to the consumer.

While some digital advertising outfits limit the frequency of the ads, many take a more persistent approach and will often keep serving the ad even after the consumer has made a purchase.

Noah Abelson-Gertler, the chief executive of ShareRoot, an ASX-listed tech company that provides a social media marketing platform focused on user privacy, said the lengths to which Facebook and Google went to surveil their users was extreme and that everyone on those services gives out masses of data about themselves every day.

He said the companies had tracked their users for years, and had built an intimate portrait of each of their inner lives. Facebook and Google each have long lists of every user’s likes and dislikes, as well as otherwise private things such as detailed family information and buying habits.

He said the tide was likely turning, at least in Australia.

“When data is collected, we as citizens should be told that this is taking place as clearly as possible, and should have the opportunity to fully control how our data is collected, how long it is stored, and lastly be given simple courses of action to penalise the companies who take advantage of our data,” Mr Abelson-Gertler told The Australian.

He said an opt-in model for ­advertising on Facebook and Google was a “no-brainer”.

“People deserve to have full control and, if given the control, people will choose what fits for them,’’ he said.

Additional reporting: Supratim Adhikari