DoubleClick cookies firmly in jar

DoubleClick beats back privacy suits
Readers' Letters: Poison cookies?

Thanks to Matthew Rippon for this pertinent point regarding DoubleClick and cookies:

I was interested to read the letter from Pat Mitchell. You will have noted of course that this was a US decision. I suspect that Doubleclick would have grave difficulties in achieving the same result in the UK.

Indeed I would go further. Any UK-based site using Doubleclick materials ought to be very wary of the provisions of the DPA, which imposes compulsory registration for the gathering and processing of the sort of data collected by Doubleclick through its use of cookies. The DPA also, in effect, imposes an "opt in" scheme.

It just might be that far from relying on the protection offered recently in the USA, Doubleclick may find themselves on the wrong end of a prosecution by the newly crowned Information Commissioner (formerly the Data Protection Registrar).

Which leads us neatly on to Jakub Papierski, who is a bit concerned:

Hey,.. just a quick query for ya... I must have missed the story about whatever doubleclick was upto, but i presume from your readers letter that it had something to do with dodgy cookies. Now what worries me is that I see doubleclick come up everytime I load The Reg. I presume you folks havent gotten any nasties splodged on your webpage by our mates from the ad company? Visiting The Reg is never a safe experience at the best of times, with most patrons leaving traumatised by all the mean words about no hoper ether-commerce companies, but heaven forbid that The Reg might be unwittingly aiding in some anti privacy free-for-all on user details!! Reassure this worried reader, :)

With pleasure. Readers concerned about the Reg and cookies are directed to our Privacy Policy.