Wikipedia
Phorm, formerly known as 121Media, was a digital technology company known for its contextual advertising software. Phorm was incorporated in Delaware but relocated to Singapore as Phorm Corporation (Singapore) Ltd in 2012. Founded in 2002, the company originally distributed programs that were considered spyware, from which they made millions of dollars in revenue. It stopped distributing those programs after complaints from groups in the United States and Canada, and announced it was talking with several United Kingdom Internet service providers (ISPs) to deliver targeted advertising based on the websites that users visited. Phorm partnered with ISPs Oi, Telefonica in Brazil, Romtelecom in Romania, and TTNet in Turkey. In June 2012, Phorm made an unsuccessful attempt to raise £20m for a 20% stake in its Chinese subsidiary.
The company's proposed advertising system, called Webwise, was a behavioral targeting service (similar to NebuAd) that useed deep packet inspection to examine traffic. Phorm said that the data collected would be anonymous and would not be used to identify users, and that their service would even include protection against phishing (fraudulent collection of users' personal information). Nonetheless, World Wide Web creator Sir Tim Berners-Lee and others spoke out against Phorm for tracking users' browsing habits, and the ISP BT Group was criticised for running secret trials of the service.
The UK Information Commissioner's Office voiced legal concerns over Webwise, and has said it would only be legal as an "opt-in" service, not an opt-out system. The European Commission called on the UK to protect Web users' privacy, and opened an infringement proceeding against the country in regard to ISPs' use of Phorm. Some groups, including Amazon.com and the Wikimedia Foundation (the non-profit organization that operates Wikipedia and other collaborative wiki projects), requested an opt-out of their websites from scans by the system. Phorm changed to an opt-in policy. According to Phorm’s website, the company would not collect any data from users who had not explicitly opted in to its services. Users had to provide separate consent for each web browsing device they used.
Phorm ceased trading on April 14, 2016.