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Trials of an online ad system carried out by BT involving more than 30,000 of its customers were potentially illegal, says a leading digital rights lawyer.
BT has said it trialled a prototype of Phorm, which matches adverts to users' web habits, in 2006 and 2007.
The company did not inform customers that they were part of the trial.
Nicholas Bohm, of the Foundation for Information Policy Research, said tests without the knowledge of users were "an illegal intercept of users' data".
A spokesman for BT said the firm had no comment about the legality or illegality of the 2006 test.
In a statement the firm said the trial was "a small scale technical test of a prototype advertising platform".
"The purpose of the test was to evaluate the functional and technical performance of the platform."
Read more
BT has said it trialled a prototype of Phorm, which matches adverts to users' web habits, in 2006 and 2007.
The company did not inform customers that they were part of the trial.
Nicholas Bohm, of the Foundation for Information Policy Research, said tests without the knowledge of users were "an illegal intercept of users' data".
A spokesman for BT said the firm had no comment about the legality or illegality of the 2006 test.
In a statement the firm said the trial was "a small scale technical test of a prototype advertising platform".
"The purpose of the test was to evaluate the functional and technical performance of the platform."
Read more
