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Canada's House of Commons Investigating MPs Web Sites Tracking Users

posted by janrinok on Sunday September 15 2019, @10:06AM   Printer-friendly
from the can't-do-that dept.

barbara hudson writes:

As reported by CBC's Liz Thompson here

The House of Commons will review all MP websites after an investigation by CBC News revealed that dozens of them have trackers that can be used to target advertising to people who have visited the sites.

... at least 99 had one or more trackers used to target advertising.

In a follow-up announcement, all MPs have now had links from the Canadian House of Commons website to their websites cut for the duration of the election.

The House of Commons has cut its links to the websites of all 334 outgoing members of Parliament after it discovered the sites of some MPs were being used to campaign for re-election.

A review by CBC News late Wednesday found that 87% of the websites for NDP MPs were automatically redirecting to the NDP.ca campaign site or MP re-election campaign sites with donation buttons.

It is illegal to use any government resources to get yourself (re-)elected in Canada. That includes web sites hosted by the House of Commons for sitting MPs.

My bet is that most MPs probably don't know that all those social media sharing icons are themselves trackers.

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  • (Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 16 2019, @03:05AM (1 child)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 16 2019, @03:05AM (#894503)

    What?

    You are concerned about a thing that is not under discussion here.

    It's not whether MPs can have tracking pixels - they can! - it's about whether or not they can serve them from their official websites which represent the government which they cannot.

    Your three paragraphs didn't discuss the issue at hand at all. It has nothing to do with effectiveness. It has nothing to do with whether or not social media impacts elections. It has everything to do with government websites have laws making it illegal to personally profit by them and politicians breaking (possibly unwittingly) those laws.

    Your points may or not be true but they're completely irrelevant to this issue.

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  • (Score: 2) by barbara hudson on Monday September 16 2019, @05:18PM

    by barbara hudson (6443) <barbara.Jane.hudson@icloud.com> on Monday September 16 2019, @05:18PM (#894699) Journal
    That is NOT the only concern. What business is it of google or Facebook if you visited the website for a particular party? Or went to a link with answers for criminal pardons or immigration or obtaining refugee status? There should be zero 3rd party trackers on any federal website.
    --
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