Does Digital Marketing Raise New Ethical Issues?

A different example involved the legal case Valentine v. NebuAd. This case involved a digital marketing company, NebuAd, that contracted with Internet service providers (ISPs) to install devices on their networks that monitored ISP subscribers' Internet activity and transmitted those data to NebuAd's California headquarters for analysis. The data were used to sell advertising tailored to subscribers' interests, which appeared in place of more generic advertisements on web pages visited by subscribers. In effect, NebuAd stepped into the communication between individuals and the browser they were using to substitute their client's ads for more generic ads that would otherwise have appeared. The advertising profits generated from this activity were split by NebuAd and its ISP partners. ISP customers filed a class- action lawsuit against both NebuAd and their ISP providers alleging that this practice violated their federal and state privacy rights. The case was finally resolved after NebuAd entered bankruptcy and agreed to pay more than $2 million to settle the case.

Research and respond to the following questions:

1. Identify as many ethical issues involved in this case as you can. Are any of these issues unique to digital marketing?
2. Explain who are the stakeholders in the NebuAd case and who was harmed by NebuAd?
3. Who should own and control personal information collected by cookies? Justify your response.
4. Discuss what limits, if any, should be placed on how that digital information is used and who has
5. access to it?
6. To what extent does an individual relinquish all claims to privacy by posting personal information
7. on a social network site? Explain your reasoning.