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This is the third of a four-part series published today and tomorrow by Noteworthy and The Journal on the growth of far-right ideology on Irish online networks, its influence and impact on real-life protests and events and the political endgame for some of its proponents.
Here, Garreth MacNamee looks at how some elements of the far right have been utilising the tactic of ‘doxxing’ to provoke followers into offline harassment and action – and hears from victims of the practice.
HARASSMENT AND DEATH threats have become a regular risk run by activists who campaign against far-right groups.
In particular, a form of online harassment known as doxxing appears to be on the rise, used as a tactic to scare critics of anti-immigrant and right-wing conspiracy theories into silence.
Over the past five months, Noteworthy and The Journal – with the help of the non-partisan online hate monitors Institute for Strategic Dialogue (ISD) – have been tracking and investigating how far-right messaging is pervading Irish online dialogue and influencing real-life events.
One persistent tactic at work is doxxing: the weaponisation of personal information online; publishing details such as a person’s home address, workplace, family details etc. in order to inspire fear in an individual that they may be living under a very real threat.
Doxxing as a form of online harassment has been a tactic used in the US for some time, by both the radical left and the far right, though often in different ways. The left usually uses it to ‘out’ a racist social media user or campaigner to their employers or to social opprobrium as demonstrated in these examples following the white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Georgia in 2017.
The far right’s intention is also to ‘expose’ their target through publication of personal data but more often in order to intensify online harassment, silence critics or – in the worst case scenario – to raise a real-life threat against that person.
Right-wing ideologies in Ireland have gathered pace and support, especially during the past year of fear and lockdowns.
Analysis from our colleagues at the Institute of Strategic Dialogue (ISD) notes that the messaging platform Telegram has seen huge growth in far-right messaging in just over a year.
Compared to 2019, when a handful of Irish far-right channels posted just over 800 messages, in 2020, 60,377 messages were posted by 34 channels. One of these channels is dedicated to doxxing individuals it views as opponents or critics to its messaging.
It is not confined to this channel – in our interviews with victims, they have found their personal details splashed on some of the most used and viewed platforms in Ireland, including Facebook, Youtube and Twitter.
***
‘These people may not have limits’
Last year, Social Democrats councillor for Galway East, Owen Hanley, took part in a counter-demonstration against anti-mask/anti-lockdown protesters who had turned up at Eyre Square.
He said he had become aware of far-right groups operating across Galway and had become one of their targets for abuse.
A day after the protest, a poster was mocked up and spread online, featuring the names and photographs of 20 people, describing them as “Galway’s Hate-Filled Antifa”. The poster accused those who protested against the anti-maskers of being “pro pedophilia”, “anti pro life”, “pro anarchism”, among other allegations.
Hanley said he hasn’t spoken about the incident before as he “didn’t want to make it real”.
He experienced threats and learned of insidious attempts to gather details about his personal life.
“It caused anxiety and fear. It made me paranoid. I have gotten stuff in the past as well including a death threat. I was taken aback. I didn’t know what to do. Thankfully it was removed from Facebook and Twitter within a few hours which was impressive.
“It’s really concerning. My face, my name and my number are out there. I am conscious that these people might not have the same limits as other people and they might take it that bit further.
On another occasion, a far-right activist sent messages to a large number of Hanley’s councillor colleagues posing as the mayor of Galway. The sender wanted to get “personal information”, according to Hanley.
“I have an idea about who it was but this is what you are dealing with. These are the people who want to go out and attack you because you stood up to them.”
‘People started putting up pictures of my home and my children
Fiona O’Leary is a mother of autistic children who first came into the public eye for her campaigns against “quackery” and “dangerous” treatments that claim to “cure” autism and are promoted online to desperate parents.
She told Noteworthy that she has since come to the attention of far-right elements, particularly after she gave a radio interview on a station in Cork in which she took issue with the policies of a right-wing election candidate.
On one occasion, O’Leary says, a far-right activist turned up on her doorstep.
“These people have ruined my life.
“I live my life scared now. I used to go for walks through the countryside but now I think of my safety. There needs to be greater attention from the gardaí on issues like these.”
Is anyone there to help?
The legal remedies available to victims of online doxxing are not yet extensive here.
A positive step came on 28 December last year, when President Michael D Higgins signed off on new legislation known as Coco’s Law.
The most striking addition Coco’s Law made to the area of harassment prosecution was to criminalise the distribution of intimate images without the person’s consent. However, what it also did was give Ireland’s harassment laws a 21st century revamp.
Under Coco’s Law, the existing legislation was also updated in the area of harassment, broadening the scope of the offence of harassment to cover other forms of persistent communications about a person. The most serious forms of harassment will now be punishable with seven to ten years in prison.
That said, the legislation isn’t necessarily an option for many victims of doxxing as it specifies “threatening or grossly offensive communication”. So if, in a doxxing situation, there is an accompanying and explicit threat to harm, then that may allow the victim to look for a criminal investigation.
But in many cases, the threat that doxxing poses to its victims is implied; a provocation to others to use the personal information posted about an individual to other ends – without the original poster actually specifying what that outcome should be.
Gardai have informed Noteworthy that anyone who feels threatened by persistent online communication should contact them to make a statement and stressed that all queries will be dealt with in the strictest of confidence.
The more public-facing of social media platforms here, Facebook and Twitter, told Noteworthy that they each have a specific policy regarding doxxing.
Facebook directed us to a section of their community standards guide which covers privacy violations. The platform states that it doesn’t allow people to share or ask for other people’s contact information – including their home address – and that threatening to share this information violates their rules. It insists that once it is made aware of doxxing content – for example, if it is reported through their ‘reporting post’ tool under ‘privacy violation’ – they can remove it.
It’s a similar story with Twitter, which told us that doxxing is a breach of Twitter rules and expressly forbidden. Again, it advises victims to report violations to them and that if Twitter agrees that a post breaches the rules, it will take “enforcement action”.
We asked Twitter and Facebook if they kept records of the number of doxxing incidents reported to them in Ireland and beyond, and to share the outcomes of those reports but no records specific to Ireland were released to us. Twitter did direct us to this report which shows the overall number of accounts suspended or posts removed in a given period but the information is a global overview.
The larger social media platforms have been grappling with the issue for years, as doxxing – in a number of formats and not just on social or messaging sites – has been a phenomenon in the US since the 1990s.
Its rise here reflects a larger picture of a far-right movement in Ireland which is taking its cues from how their ideological counterparts have been operating elsewhere.
Assistant professor of sociology at Trinity College Dublin, David Ralph told Noteworthy that the far-right in Ireland is effectively a “copy and paste” groups in the US and Europe.
“I find that amazing. There is no reference to history or context and those ideas are copy/pasteable from one country to the next. There is nothing new that you haven’t heard from the Irish far right that you haven’t heard from AFD in Germany, for example.”
Ralph’s expertise centres around migration and how racism is able to develop and ferment over time. There are often broader social reasons as to why people might get caught up in the world of the extreme right; with one of the main reasons being the lack of exposure to diversity, according to Ralph.
The opportunism shown by far-right groupings in exploiting concerns and miscommunication around immigration and direct provision in Ireland, for example, is identified in this first piece in our project, by Cónal Thomas.
“If you look at people growing up in a homogenous society, maybe in rural areas, they are not exposed to different cultures and diversity,” said Ralph. “(And) if you have not been to third level (education) or done a lot of international travelling, then that can add to it as well.
“You put those two things together along with someone who is socially disadvantaged, then that can be a very heady sort of cocktail.”
The “heady cocktail”
George Nkencho was shot dead by gardaí in Clonee on 30 December last year. The 27-year-old’s death is the subject of a Gsoc (Garda Ombudsman) investigation.
Nkencho, who was suffering from mental health difficulties, was allegedly brandishing a knife and threatened gardaí before he was shot.
Within hours of Nkencho’s death, disinformation was rife online, with baseless allegations made against the victim and his family, including an image that claimed George Nkencho was a violent criminal with multiple convictions. This Journal FactCheck showed this allegation to be false but found that at least 2,400 accounts had shared the false claim image in the six days following the shooting.
According to analysis by the Institute of Strategic Dialogue on ethno-nationalist/anti-immigrant channels on messaging app Telegram, there is evidence that this misinformation was spread in a calculated campaign to capitalise on the death of George Nkencho, with channels “sharing clear instructions to its members on how best to react to the shooting to stir up racial tensions, including by spreading disinformation and targeted hate”.
“The language and phraseology used by these channels is associated with US and international far-right and white supremacist ideology.”
In Telegram accounts observed by Noteworthy, George is regularly described as a “dindu nuffin” – a derogatory term for a black pderson who is the victim of police violence. This phrase, a stylised pronunciation of “didn’t do nothing”, was created in the US.
One message posted in the aftermath of Nkencho’s death reads:
“They have their own George Floyd now. Except this fella was way more guilty then George Floyd. Just imagine if an Irish fella in England went on that rampage with a blade that this African did in Dublin, imagine the whole Irish community coming out to support him, no you can’t because it would never happen in a million years, good enough for him we’d say. This is racial and only racial ingroup preference you are looking at here. This is gone from us individuals, but we need to start looking at every one of these Africans as being part of the same problem because they are.”
Leon Diop is one of the spokespeople for Black and Irish, an activist group dedicated to promoting black Irish voices and calling out racism.
He told Noteworthy: “Black and Irish was only founded in June 2020 at the height of the BLM movement. In that time, we have seen a dramatic increase in racist commentary in our country. Especially since the tragic death of George Nkencho. We saw the far right, along with many average white Irish people online, use his tragic death as reason to sow division, hate and fake news.
“The far right are actively connecting with people who are mainstream or not,” said Diop. “They did not just appear out of nowhere, they have always been around, and we have been far too slow to wake up to this reality. For too long, this feeling of ‘Ah, at least we’re not America or the UK’ has allowed these evil actors to grow in strength within the shadows.”
Diop said the longer we refuse to deny the strength of their presence, the more influential they become.
“Look how easy it was for these hateful people to spread lies and fake news about George Nkencho. Look how easy it was for many Irish people to accept those lies and fake news as fact,” he added.
Since Nkencho’s death, there has been rhetoric from right-wing commentators that west Dublin is but an African township in Dublin and that roving gangs of black teenagers, armed with machetes, are coming to kill innocent, white teenagers.
When Noteworthy put this scenario to a source who is involved in community policing in west Dublin, they called these claims “absolute dangerous bullshit”.
Balbriggan and the ‘African township’ ruse
Balbriggan is a seaside town on the very edge of north Dublin. In the last 20 years, the town has seen an increase in the number of different ethnicities living there.
Since 2019, interest in the town by the far right has increased significantly.
According to Lucy Michael, a spokeswoman for the Fingal Communities Against Racism, tensions flared when Gemma O’Doherty ran as an independent candidate in the Fingal constituency in the general election of 2020.
O’Doherty had claimed that a “globalist agenda” was ruining Balbriggan.
Online accounts started to describe Balbriggan as “an African township” and a “no-go area for whites”.
Videos were shared online showing fights between local groups of teenagers in Balbriggan. The clips purport to show “black gangs” – a phrase often mentioned by the uploaders – but, in fact, they are groups, both black and white, who have been part of alleged anti-social behaviour in the town.
As reported in TheJournal in September last year, an electrical fire in a house in Balbriggan was used by far-right groups to spread misinformation about the black community in the town.
Conspiracy theories blamed the house fire on “African gangs” and even claimed a drug dealer lived at the house. Both claims were completely false.
But Michael explained how, within hours of the fire, a video mixing together clips of anti-social behaviour and the house fire were being shared on social media.
“There was someone there – ready to mix together these clips with the single goal of blaming the black community. It was up and online that same day and this is shared on WhatsApp and other social media and becomes the rumour,” she explained.
Incidents such as these create the false narrative that white Irish people are a minority in Balbriggan. But the town does have its problem with anti-social behaviour – something its local activists do not shy away from.
Speaking to Noteworthy, John Uwhumiakpor said there is unacceptable behaviour in the town but that it is being carried out by a cross-section of people, and not an issue solely for the black community.
A man was convicted last month of racially abusing Uwhumiakpor, who ran as a People Before Profit candidate, in January 2020.
Prior to the incident, his campaign poster had been used in an online video as “evidence” of “a globalist agenda” in Ireland.
And racist commentary such as this post featuring Uwhumiakpor began appearing on numerous accounts online:
Uwhumiakpor says that his photo, and not that of any other election candidate in the area, was used for a specific reason.
“I think it’s so important that people see that, yes, there is unacceptable behaviour from the teenagers but this is from both sides. It is not just the African teenager or the gangs as people call them. They are teenagers.”
Far right here ‘replicating’ US and UK campaigns
Shane O’Curry is the director of the Irish Network Against Racism (INAR). The work of the NGO means that O’Curry is at the coalface of the fight against racism.
For O’Curry, he believes the political upheaval following the Brexit result and the election of Donald Trump in 2016 “emboldened” the Irish far right and gave it the impetus to forge its own path in Ireland.
“We saw these results and the rhetoric surrounding both the campaigns spilling over into Ireland. I think it had such a big reaction here because the US and the UK are similar to us in language and culture. We saw the far right here replicating the campaigns in these countries.”
The copycat behaviour also included social media. Message boards on Reddit and 4Chan had their own Irish far-right sections, Telegram was fast becoming the messaging system hardcore white ethno-nationalist groups. The entire subculture, with its own memes and toxic tactics, had arrived in Ireland – and included doxxing.
“They started going after people they did not agree with,” said O’Curry. “The far-right grifters, the ones with the blogs and the followers, they were smart enough not to say anything too outrageous or overtly racist – they instead gave their followers a target and let them do the dirty work.”
O’Curry soon found himself the victim of doxxing and received death threats which worried him so much that he went to the gardaí.
“I get named in various forums. I have appeared on different lists created by people. I have been named in real-life meetings.
“I have had threats – both direct and indirect, some of which I considered passed the threshold to contact the gardaí.
“I know one of the doxxings of me was on a document that was circulated through several social media mediums – it was shared in Facebook groups – it may have been shared in a Reddit group – it may have been shared in a Telegram group – my name, some of the activities I am associated with.”
What these doxxings did, according to O’Curry, was to point the finger at him to be a target of right-wing abuse.
While the doxxing concerned him originally, it was the ease with which people would discuss killing him that made the activist fear for his own safety.
As a result of the harassment, O’Curry brought in a security consultant to his workplace. There are now providers in place to ensure the safety of all those who work in the building.
***
O’Curry feels that proper garda responses must be set up to deal with the “very real threat from the far right”.
For O’Curry, it’s easy: “You don’t make a martyr of them – you make a fool of them.”
Galway councillor Owen Hanley, who has received death threats online, said there needs to be greater accountability both by social media firms as well as those who use the platforms.
“I think I was one of the fortunate ones. The post which was put up, the one with my face accusing me of being ‘pro-pedohilia’, that was taken down within a few hours which I was really surprised by.
“I don’t know if that was an anomaly or it’s because I am a local representative; I know of other people who have had terrible experiences and awful things written about them and it stays up. I think there needs to be real action on issues like these and just talking about it.”
Lucy Michael of Fingal Communities Against Racism referred to the family at the centre of the house fire in Balbriggan who had to go into hiding due to fears for their safety after far-right groups created the narrative that a drug dealer had been living at the house and that it was started maliciously.
“Within two hours of the fire on the 9th, somebody in a far-right group had stitched together a video of kids fighting with an image of a fire. Someone video edited that together within two hours. They have a strategy ready to go.”
John Uwhumiakpor says: “It is something that needs to be changed. You can not have one person say this and that it stays online even if it is a lie. We need to be able to say ‘no’ this is not acceptable anymore.”
***
This investigation was carried out by investigative platform Noteworthy and our colleagues at The Journal.
The idea for this investigation was proposed and funded by you, our readers, as well as with support from the Noteworthy general fund to cover additional costs.
You can support our work by submitting an idea, funding for a particular proposal or setting up a monthly contribution to our general investigative fund HERE>>
House Irish before EU citizens. Imagine us asking for a sleeping bag nevermind a social home for life in another EU country? See those EU citizens getting housed on the RTE property doc??
Irish single / separated / divorced males are the very last on the social housing list, and are if they are incredibly lucky offered flats in places like Bohola and Dromahair and other back of behinds. According to EU rules refugees from certain countries are the very top of said list.
Single mothers with kids next and everyone else after but before single / divorced / separated Irish males. A corpse would get a place before them.
@Glen Quagmire: Any info how many EU citizens buy a property in Ireland recently (percentage) ? And I don’t mean foreigner Property Funds as we all know their market share is about 25% already.
@John O’Driscoll: that’s exactly it John. People all over the country are sick of it and it only creates resentment, sure no wonder. If they’re playing an unequal game then the people they’re meant to serve won’t accept and have every right to complain. They’re liars, a friend of mine, male, queried DCC about allocations if a single woman comes before a single man on the list and if non nationals inc refugees are given priority over families waiting longer. “Oh no we don’t do that here, everyone is treated equally” that is just pure utter BS! Someone is pulling strings because all over Ireland so many people know families seeing houses given to people who are not waiting as long but all because of race. That in itself is either racism towards their own or some type of diversity agenda in allocations which they’re not saying.
@Paudi Onail: Syria and Eritrea top of the list with other nationalities coming next and single mothers after them. Irish single males have to wait til the devil skates to work.
@Glen Quagmire: You clown, then EU countries can apply the same for the 1 million Irish living in the EU. What do you think that this is Luxembourg that we don’t migrate?
@Glen Quagmire: it simple change the emigration rules and stop a lot of the people who are coming here putting pressure on housing , schools and hospitals.
Anyone who is offered accommodation in Dromahair is indeed very lucky. It’s one of the prettiest villages in Ireland with a vibrant community. I’ve even heard it referred to as the Dalkey of the Northwest. The only refugees we tend to see are musicians, artists and professional people sick of the sewer that is Dublin. If you want the back of behinds then think of somewhere else.
@ryan3939: Yeah, lets stop the doctors, specialists, consultants, engineers, nurses and foreign companies from coming over here because ryan here is on the dole and rather than get educated to get a job he wants a free handout…..
Honestly, Ireland would be hiring the likes of you for trained jobs if it werent for immigration, and if it werent for emigration there would be at least double the number of people living on this island.
@John O’Driscoll:
I would love to be offered a house in Bohola it might mean I could be a billionaire like all the rest of the locals who are big in London
Social housing now PLEASE
@Glen Quagmire: provate housing only.
@Glen Quagmire: all types of housing, not just free houses.
@Dilly Dong: HAP & Rent allowance are NOT proper social housing. FG & Labour introduced this insult to those needing housing. FF seem ok with this now & they will not get away with this at the next sooner than later election.
More social housing equals more ghettos. We need to discourage the lower classes from resting on their laurels. Social housing should be for the most vulnerable in our society. Instead, it is used overwhelmingly by people who wouldn’t work a day in their lives.
@George Orwell: There is and always has been a majority of people working who live in social housing
@George Orwell: Send our “the lower classes” quickly to Canada before they adopt same immigration regulations Australia did !!!
@George Orwell: “More social housing equals more ghettos.”
It wouldn’t if developers were required to provide a certain percentage of new developments for social housing, instead of paying a fee to (i.e. bribe) the council to avoid it like they can do now.
This would spread out the social housing all around the country, instead of only having it in certain areas.
@Glen Quagmire: The state can build both social and private dwellings – on a site by site basis. There is no reason the state can not use its resources to build integrated developments that have both social housing retained by the state for rental social housing and private dwellings for sale – Sell off to the private sector well built well thought out developments that meet the requirements of the nation – profits go back in building additional developments –
Expecting the private sector to meet the demands of a fast growing population by adding bureaucracy on to the build process is madness – Developers are not the right people to solve this problem our town planners and councils are
@brian boru: You are right in saying that our town planners and councils should solve this problem, but do you seriously expect the current bunch to be up to the task?
@Larissa Caroline Nikolaus: Yes – I would prefer to see a well thought out strategy instead of leaving it to the random nature of development that goes into private investment builds
The state has the land, has the knowledge, has the resources, the finance, and the information on what housing is needed – instead we leave it to the same process that let us down before to build homes of back room deals and profiteering by cute whoors – Build the homes the country needs and do it right by building well built integrated housing developments and do it while making a profit on the sale of the private sector
@meatyslaps: Why should someone who is paying €400k of a mortgage have to live beside someone who is living for free off the state?!?!?
Wake up would ya….
Build taller in the city centre!!!
@Fred Jensen: Why only in the city (Dublin I presume) centre ?
@cortisola:
Well a little thing called economics…it makes sense to build tall where land values are highest…as per every other country in the world. But anyone who wants to build higher outside city centre has my blessing.
No more landlord welfare
@Glen Quagmire:
No more free house with a garden just because you have two kids.
@Fred Jensen: Having kinds surely is one of reasons we have housing problem. HAVE NO CHILDREN PEOPLE !!!
@Glen Quagmire: Considering they brought in legislation to force landlords to accept rent allowance why do you think it is welfare for them? When they reduced RA and landlords didn’t need to take the drop and put up their rent for new tenants. HAP requires landlords to reduce their rent so again how is this welfare? How about we expect the government to fund social welfare rather than trying to get private individuals to subsidise them?
Find a landlord that will take HAP? Find a decent liveable home that available for HAP tenants in the competition for rent??
@Glen Quagmire: You are talking out from both sides of your month on this. It is obviously not landlord welfare as they don’t need or want to rent to those on social welfare payments. If you aren’t happy with what is provided by the private sector nor the public housing then you don’t have an option other than buy your own.
People always say you’re lucky to have a roof over your head – in a developed country like Ireland, this should not be a literal saying.
A delightful combination of young mothers popping out as many kids as they need to in order to get a free house and no accountability for those scamming the welfare system, landlords captialising on lack of supply and pushing rents up past Celtic Tiger levels, and a genuine failure by our government to address any of the housing issues whilst simultaneously dragging new business into Ireland and especially Dublin off the back of Brexit – the ordinary Joe Soap doesn’t even get a look in.
We’re such a small country – the level of corruption is genuinely amazing. Really Irish that we can keep f*cking over our own working, tax-paying or otherwise socially contributing citizens over and over again but sure, that’s the way it is. Apathy and classicism will be the ruination of this country.
Stop stigmatising areas & councils should buy build and restore social housing EVERYWHERE. Councils should have bought private houses in estates & rent them to the most needy & well behaved people on their lists which the majority are. They should build one off houses in the country for those it would suit like they did up until the crash.
@Glen Quagmire: the problem with socialists is they think there is a bottomless pit of money available! Where do you think the money is going to come from?
VULTURE FUNDS APPLE BONDHOLDERS & BANKS HAVE GOT & CONTINUE TO RECEIVE A BOTTOMLESS PIT OF WELFARE
@Glen Quagmire: i actually doubt you understand what any of them mean
@Dark Knight: What you should learn & understand is the rules of capitalism SHOULD have applied to these capitalist companies & THEIR PRIVATE DEBTS are NOT the Irish public’s debt
@Glen Quagmire: ‘vulture’ funds have provided cash to the irish government at a time when nobody else was willing to! Apple were always going to appeal their fine, what sort of idiot would have accepted the cash and then for the ruling to be overturned, lose out every which way then. If the banks failed it would have been fatal and there would be a much worse homeless crisis! I have no idea why you dragged bondholders into this or what your issue is with them. I actually presume it’s just a buzzword you use and you have no idea what a bondholder is
Council own land should be leased or sold to people on low income with a credit union loan they could easily enough built a one bed property then when they have a family add on to the property.
@JustMade Ireland: selling council property is what got us into this mess! Councils should be barred from the sale of property.
@Sham Rogue: I thought the same it only a problem if they don’t use the money to rebuild if they built sold or rented to fund new houseing it better more as people generally have more pride in something they own. We should be asking what did they do with that money.
Ah sure everyone wants to be like the Germans and rent apparently. Anyone have survey of Germans/Europeans and whether they actually choose to rent or whether they would prefer to buy but cant afford
Only problem with houses is that their way too expensive, over half of the building cost of your bog standard 3 bed semi are government imposed, maybe just maybe it might be an idea to remove some of these one off costs (taxes) and move them into the property tax over the lifetime of the property instead of loading them upfront maybe
So many potential homes are mothballed and vacant.
Other potential homes are blocked booked for employees of MNCs.
So many potential homes are allocated to Air B&B.
Social and affordable accommodation is not being constructed.
Large tracts of development land are being hoarded for future speculative gain and profit.
Investment funds are highly selective about the social status of prospective tenants.
Other potential homes are in the wrong location because of bad spatial planning or complete absence of spatial planning.
Banks are holding on to repossessed homes so as to take advantage of a rising market.
Population is increasing.
Why on earth is there a housing emergency?
The threats of high
@Tom Molloy: High taxes and the treatment of saver/investors as villains by media is having a negative effect.
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Advertising presented to you on this service can be based on your advertising profiles, which can reflect your activity on this service or other websites or apps (like the forms you submit, content you look at), possible interests and personal aspects.
Information about your activity on this service (for instance, forms you submit, non-advertising content you look at) can be stored and combined with other information about you (such as your previous activity on this service or other websites or apps) or similar users. This is then used to build or improve a profile about you (which might for example include possible interests and personal aspects). Your profile can be used (also later) to present content that appears more relevant based on your possible interests, such as by adapting the order in which content is shown to you, so that it is even easier for you to find content that matches your interests.
Content presented to you on this service can be based on your content personalisation profiles, which can reflect your activity on this or other services (for instance, the forms you submit, content you look at), possible interests and personal aspects. This can for example be used to adapt the order in which content is shown to you, so that it is even easier for you to find (non-advertising) content that matches your interests.
Information regarding which advertising is presented to you and how you interact with it can be used to determine how well an advert has worked for you or other users and whether the goals of the advertising were reached. For instance, whether you saw an ad, whether you clicked on it, whether it led you to buy a product or visit a website, etc. This is very helpful to understand the relevance of advertising campaigns.
Information regarding which content is presented to you and how you interact with it can be used to determine whether the (non-advertising) content e.g. reached its intended audience and matched your interests. For instance, whether you read an article, watch a video, listen to a podcast or look at a product description, how long you spent on this service and the web pages you visit etc. This is very helpful to understand the relevance of (non-advertising) content that is shown to you.
Reports can be generated based on the combination of data sets (like user profiles, statistics, market research, analytics data) regarding your interactions and those of other users with advertising or (non-advertising) content to identify common characteristics (for instance, to determine which target audiences are more receptive to an ad campaign or to certain contents).
Information about your activity on this service, such as your interaction with ads or content, can be very helpful to improve products and services and to build new products and services based on user interactions, the type of audience, etc. This specific purpose does not include the development or improvement of user profiles and identifiers.
Content presented to you on this service can be based on limited data, such as the website or app you are using, your non-precise location, your device type, or which content you are (or have been) interacting with (for example, to limit the number of times a video or an article is presented to you).
With your acceptance, your precise location (within a radius of less than 500 metres) may be used in support of the purposes explained in this notice.
With your acceptance, certain characteristics specific to your device might be requested and used to distinguish it from other devices (such as the installed fonts or plugins, the resolution of your screen) in support of the purposes explained in this notice.
Your data can be used to monitor for and prevent unusual and possibly fraudulent activity (for example, regarding advertising, ad clicks by bots), and ensure systems and processes work properly and securely. It can also be used to correct any problems you, the publisher or the advertiser may encounter in the delivery of content and ads and in your interaction with them.
Certain information (like an IP address or device capabilities) is used to ensure the technical compatibility of the content or advertising, and to facilitate the transmission of the content or ad to your device.
Information about your activity on this service may be matched and combined with other information relating to you and originating from various sources (for instance your activity on a separate online service, your use of a loyalty card in-store, or your answers to a survey), in support of the purposes explained in this notice.
In support of the purposes explained in this notice, your device might be considered as likely linked to other devices that belong to you or your household (for instance because you are logged in to the same service on both your phone and your computer, or because you may use the same Internet connection on both devices).
Your device might be distinguished from other devices based on information it automatically sends when accessing the Internet (for instance, the IP address of your Internet connection or the type of browser you are using) in support of the purposes exposed in this notice.
The choices you make regarding the purposes and entities listed in this notice are saved and made available to those entities in the form of digital signals (such as a string of characters). This is necessary in order to enable both this service and those entities to respect such choices.
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