Let’s paint a picture; a 40-year-old Tom Cruise walks through a shopping mall. Pocket sized cameras lace the walls where they intermittently scan his face. Adverts nearby spark to life with messages targeted specifically at the man. This is a scene from the 2002 film minority report and the internet we live in today is not much different.
"Targeting ads so they show to the right customers is an essential part of a successful advertising campaign. You might have designed the perfect ad to attract your customers to your business, but unless you show it to the right people at the right time, your ad alone won’t help you reach your goal
-Google Support"
Targeted advertising is a form of advertising that focuses on a range of traits from the consumer, including; age ranges, location, and shopping habits. When it comes to online targeted advertising the well known approach is the use of Cookies. Cookies allow advertisers to cross reference information such as IP addresses and referrers when used on the same device. That being the case, however, a new form of targeted advertising has manifested in the past year is the use of tracking via users logging into accounts.
Common legislation in the EU and UK will normally allow users to opt out of targeted advertising, such as the data protection act in the UK and GDPR soon coming across all EU member states. Users that wish to opt out of Google’s targeted advertising can visit the advertising section of their account. To review your Facebook advertising settings you can visit your account settings.