AT&T’s plan to watch your Web browsing—and what you can do about it

Saturday, March 28, 2015
By Paul Martin

Want to opt out? It could cost up to $744 extra per year.

by Jon Brodkin
Arstechnica.com
Mar 27, 2015

If you have AT&T’s gigabit Internet service and wonder why it seems so affordable, here’s the reason—AT&T is boosting profits by rerouting all your Web browsing to an in-house traffic scanning platform, analyzing your Internet habits, then using the results to deliver personalized ads to the websites you visit, e-mail to your inbox, and junk mail to your front door.

In a few select areas including Austin, Texas, and Kansas City, Missouri—places where AT&T competes against the $70-per-month Google Fiber—Ma Bell offers its own $70-per-month “GigaPower” fiber-to-the-home Internet access. But signing up for the deal also opts customers in to AT&T’s “Internet Preferences” program, which gives the company permission to examine each customer’s Web traffic in exchange for a price that matches Google’s.

AT&T charges at least another $29 a month ($99 total) to provide standalone Internet service that doesn’t perform this extra scanning of your Web traffic. The privacy fee can balloon to more than $60 for bundles including TV or phone service. Certain modem rental and installation fees also apply only to service plans without Internet Preferences.

It wouldn’t be accurate to say that paying extra gives customers “enhanced” privacy; paying those monthly fees that add up to hundreds of dollars more per year simply provides the same level of privacy customers would get from other Internet providers, or from AT&T’s slower DSL and fiber-to-the-node services.

AT&T says Internet Preferences tracks “the webpages you visit, the time you spend on each, the links or ads you see and follow, and the search terms you enter.” This helps AT&T serve ads targeted to each user based on that person’s interests. And advertisers are willing to pay more when they know their ads will be shown only to the people most likely to be interested in their products.

The Rest…HERE

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