Have you ever felt that your phone reads your thoughts? Looking for sneakers, invading your shoes ads your pages on the Internet. And you remember your intention to travel to Mexico in a private message, and you find a flood of hotel offers in Kanikon on your Instagram account. These are not coincidences, but a direct result of a revolution in the world of digital advertising led by artificial intelligence.
In a report published by the American news magazine, Jesus Maysa, the major advertising companies, reveals more of users than they imagine, through advanced technical tools that bring together and analyze their behavior with extreme accuracy.
From cookies to connected identity maps
In the past, digital ads relied on “cookies” or tracking devices. Today, companies such as “Pits Group” depend on continuous digital identity maps that define the user as a real individual, and link his activity through several platforms.
“We do not deal with devices or cookies, but with real people … artificial intelligence is worth nothing without data.”.
Sadon pointed out that the new artificial intelligence system developed by his company, known as “Cori”, is able to track and interact with 91% of adults connected to the Internet around the world.
What do those advertisers know about you?
According to “Plix”, the “Epsilon” database that the company uses contains information about 2.3 billion people around the world, and includes 7,000 databases per person only within the United States. This data includes:
- What the user sees and what he reads.
- Whoever lives with him.
- Whoever follows him on social media.
- What he buys (online and on stores).
- When, where and why do he buy?
Tracking this data is not limited to digital activity, but also includes 75% of the transactions that take place inside the stores.
As an example of accuracy, the company “Lula”, a virtual figure based on real data, presented the company about it from its interests to its purchasing habits, and even the possibility of changing its loyalty to a trademark in the event that the prices of its products change or their income.
“If the price of its favorite juice increases and its income remains as it is, the system expects it will move to a cheaper brand, and the ads are automatically modified accordingly,” Sadoun.
Great sectors in the footsteps of Pix
Other giant companies such as Meta (Facebook and Instagram) and Dubai have adopted this model. Meta has developed tools that depend on artificial intelligence to improve the targeting of advertisements, while Adobe launched a full framework for managing marketing campaigns via obstetric intelligence, with the aim of improving the user experience.
In a remarkable statement, Dan Dern, the financial manager of Dubai, said: “Our ambition is that the entire income of the company is affected by ads backed by artificial intelligence.”
But .. what about privacy?
In contrast, concerns about privacy increases. Even when users choose not to track them, reports indicate that the data is still collected and used. A 2022 study was published on the “Don Urg Archive” website, which revealed that many advertisers are still dealing with user data, despite laws such as the general regulations for data protection in Europe (GDPR) and the Consumer Consumer Privacy Law (CCBA).
“It is clear that there are questions that are asked about our dependence on systems that deal with user data of this size and without effective control,” Representative Ruth Kadbury said in statements to the British media.
The ads that target you today are no longer based only on what you click, but to thousands of digital signals that are collected from you every day.
While companies believe that artificial intelligence has made marketing more effective and less sowing, critics believe that the door has opened an economy based on monitoring the individual and directing his consumer behavior with unprecedented accuracy.
Artificial intelligence may have converted ads into “personal conversations”, but he also asked a disturbing question: To what extent do we actually control our digital data and identities?
