Group rips Microsoft over Internet user profiling research: "Algorithms could help governments finger critics, says Reporters Without Borders

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In a paper presented at the International World Wide Web Conference last month in Calgary, Canada, four researchers at Microsoft's Beijing-based lab laid out work that predicted the age and gender ( PDF format) of unknown Web users based on the sites they visited. Their new algorithms correctly guessed the gender of a Web surfer 80% of the time, and his or her age 60% of the time.

'Demographic information is usually not easy to obtain,' the researchers said. 'Internet users are reluctant to expose this kind of personal data to public. The alternative way to predict users' demographic information is then of great interest.' The Microsoft researchers said such predictions could be used to better personalize Web applications and fine-tune online advertising.

Paris-based Reporters Without Borders objected not only to the research, but also to where it was conducted. 'The technologies Microsoft is working on would allow it to gather information about Internet users without their knowledge,' the group said in a statement. 'These technologies could eventually lead to the creation of programs that could identify 'subversive' citizens. We believe it is unacceptable to carry out this kind of sensitive research in a country such as China where 50 people are currently in prison because of what they posted online.'

American companies such as Yahoo Inc., Google, Inc., and Microsoft gather 'fantastic' amounts of data about their Web visitors, Reporters Without Borders said, but 'this kind of data accumulation obviously poses even more ethical problems in a country such as China which has absolutely no respect for the private lives of Internet users.'

Microsoft's researchers said they would expand their work to other demographic attributes, such as occupation, educational degree and geographic location, which has Reporters Without Borders even more worried."

(Read Original Article - Via computerworld .)