zlacker

>>pbrw+(OP)
I might be in the minority here but I personally find personalized ads useful, and am far more annoyed by ads recommending products and services completely irrelevant to my interests and/or needs.

(The latter still account for the ads I see most of the time, unfortunately.)

>>arbuge+qN1
There are types of personalised advertising which aren't deemed harmful, but are still useful. Examples include providing alternatives and suggestions based directly on the user's input/selections, or other non-specific criteria such as the weather, season, holidays etc. This is the equivalent of a shop clerk noticing you're looking at scarves, and showing you alternatives, or bringing more out stock because it's winter. This isn't invasive advertising, and this kind of advertising is not being targeted.

What is being targeted is surveillance-based advertising methods. These involve the collection, brokering and combining of user data. This data is purchasable by anyone - including US government agencies which have been using it as way of obtaining information without oversight(1). There is an expectation that other governments and bad actors are also obtaining this data for advantage.

This type of advertising is also responsible for poorly targeted ads that follow you around the internet. Perhaps you mentioned something in passing on an instagram chat, or you liked a photo from a friend on holiday.

Consumers generally underestimate their digital footprint and the risks associated with having this information available. It's more information than what we'd trust our own governments possessing in a single, or any, database, yet we let others take it without any oversight whatsoever. Additionally the information gathered about them can be wrong or invade their privacy in ways they aren't expecting (E.g. infer their sexuality or private desires) (2). Furthermore individual users can be targeted which beyond being able to prank someone(3), is also ripe for exploitation. (4)

(1) https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/23844477-odni-declas... or the easier to read: https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/security/us-government-buys-dat...

(2) https://techcrunch.com/2018/05/16/facebook-faces-fresh-criti...

(3) https://www.adweek.com/performance-marketing/roommate-makes-...

(4) https://techcrunch.com/2021/10/15/researchers-show-facebooks...