Over the weekend, Twitter, the microblogging service that has transformed how we interact with people on the internet, announced plans to experiment with how ads are displayed on individual user’s Twitter feed.

Twitter claims that the experiment aims to deliver more useful ads to its US users from brands and businesses, but insists that we won’t suddenly find our feeds flooded with ads. What Twitter aims to accomplish is to bring brands and people interested in their products or services closer without encroaching on anyone’s feeds.

But how would this be possible?  In order for Twitter ad targeting to work, your browser should allow cookie tracking, and you’ll also need to check the “Promoted content” option on your Twitter account settings.  With this, a brand, say an online florist, might be able to advertise a special offer for a special occasion, but only to those Twitterers who frequent their website or subscribe to its newsletter.  The florist may share with Twitter a scrambled, unreadable email address (a hash) or browser-related information (a browser cookie ID), which the microblogging service can use to identify appropriate Twitter accounts in order to show them a Promoted Tweet with the special promo.

With this method, Twitter doesn’t have to share any more user information with these brands or advertisers other than what’s actually needed.

In light of the Ed Snowden leaks, this probably isn’t the best time to announce any kind of ad targeting experiment that relies on tracking users and reading their personal data, but on the other hand, at least Twitter is honest about how it all works.  We may not like being tracked, but at least Twitter is keeping us informed of the fact, unlike millions of other websites and services that track you even without your knowledge.

STOP IT!

So if you’re not too keen on being tracked for tailored ads, you can always opt out. Make sure your Do Not Track setting on your browser is enabled and adjust your Twitter account settings to so that you won’t be displayed any promoted content. Additionally you can download the DoNotTrackMe add-on to your browser, which keeps you informed of which websites are tracking you and allows you to block or allow individual tracking services on each website you visit.

“While we want to make our ads more useful, we also want to give users simple and meaningful privacy options. Simply uncheck the box next to ‘Promoted content’ in your account settings, and Twitter will not match your account to information shared by our ad partners for tailoring ads. This is the only place you’ll need to disable this feature on Twitter,” Twitter stated in a blog post.