#ccpa | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

eraepoch · 5 months ago

Text

[Full Text] Emerging Media Companies, Tracking Cookies, and Data Privacy -- An open letter to Critical Role, Dropout, and fellow audience members

Summary / TL;DR

Both Critical Role (CR) and Dropout have begun exclusively using links provided by third-party digital marketing solution companies in their email newsletters.

Every link in each of the newsletters (even the unsubscribe link) goes through a third-party domain which is flagged as a tracking server by the uBlock Origin browser extension.

Third-party tracking cookies are strictly unnecessary and come with a wide array of risks, including non-consensual targeted advertising, targeted misinformation, doxxing, and the potential for abuse by law enforcement.

You are potentially putting your privacy at risk every time you click on any of the links in either of these newsletters.

IMO these advertising companies (and perhaps CR/Dropout by proxy) are likely breaking the law in the EU and California by violating the GDPR and CCPA respectively.

Even if Critical Role and Dropout are not directly selling or exploiting your personal data, they are still profiting off of it by contracting with, and receiving services from, companies who almost certainly are. The value of your personal data is priced into the cost of these services.

They should stop, and can do so without any loss of web functionality.

1/7. What is happening?

Critical Role and Dropout have begun exclusively using links provided by third-party digital marketing solution companies in their email newsletters.

[ID: A screenshot of the Dropout newsletter alongside the page’s HTML source which shows that the target destination for an anchor element in the email leads to d2xR2K04.na1.hubspotlinks.com. End ID.]

[ID: A screenshot of the CR newsletter alongside the page’s HTML source which shows that the target destination for an anchor element in the email leads to trk.klclick.com. End ID.]

The domains attached to these links are flagged as advertising trackers by the uBlock Origin browser extension.

[ID: Screenshot of a Firefox web browser. The page displays a large warning icon and reads “uBlock Origin has prevented the following page from loading [...] because of the following filter: `||hubspotlinks.com` found in Peter Lowe’s Ad and tracking server list. End ID.]

[ID: Screenshot of a Firefox web browser. The page displays a large warning icon and reads “uBlock Origin has prevented the following page from loading [...] because of the following filter: `||klclick1.com` found in Peter Lowe’s Ad and tracking server list. End ID.]

In both cases, every link in the newsletter goes through the flagged third-party domain, and the intended endpoint (Twitter, their store page, etc.) is completely obscured and inaccessible from within the email itself. Even the unsubscribe links feed through the tracking service.

You can test this yourself in your own email client by hovering your cursor over a link in the email without clicking it and watching to see what URL pops up. You may have noticed this yourself if you use uBlock Origin as an ad-blocker.

I don’t know for certain when this first started. It’s possible that this has been going on for a year or more at this point, or it may have started just a few months ago. Either way: it ought to stop.

2/7. What is a tracking cookie?

A tracking cookie is a unique, universally identifiable value placed on your machine by somebody with the intention of checking for that value later to identify you (or at least to identify your machine).

Tracking cookies are used by companies to create advertising behaviour profiles. These profiles are supposedly anonymous, but even if the marketing companies creating them are not lying about that (a tough sell for me personally, but your mileage may vary when it comes to corporations with 9-figure annual incomes), the data can often be de-anonymized.

If this happens, the data can be used to identify the associated user, potentially including their full name, email address, phone number, and physical address—all of which may then be associated with things like their shopping habits, hobbies, preferences, the identities of their friends and family, gender, political opinions, job history, credit score, sexuality, and even when they ovulate.

Now, it is important to note that not all cookies are tracking cookies. A cookie is just some data from a web page that persists on your machine and gets sent back to the server that put it there. Cookies in general are not necessarily malicious or harmful, and are often essential to certain web features functioning correctly (e.g. keeping the user logged in on their web browser after they close the tab). But the thing to keep in mind is that a domain has absolute control over the information that has been stored on your computer by that domain, so allowing cookies is a matter of trusting the specific domain that wants to put them there. You can look at the outgoing information being sent from your machine, but its purpose cannot be determined without knowing what is being done with it on the other side, and these marketing companies ought not to have the benefit of your doubt when they have already been flagged by privacy watchdogs.

3/7. What’s the harm?

Most urgently, as I touched on above: The main source of harm is from corporations profiting off of your private data without your informed consent. However, targeted advertising is actually the least potentially harmful outcome of tracking cookies.

1/6. Data brokers

A data broker is an individual or company that specializes in collecting personal data (such as personal income, ethnicity, political beliefs, geolocation data, etc.) and selling or licensing such information to third parties for a variety of uses, such as background checks conducted by employers and landlords, two universally benevolent groups of people.

There are varying regulations around the world limiting the collection of information on individuals, and the State of California passed a law attempting to address this problem in 2018, following in the footsteps of the EU’s GDPR, but in the jurisdiction of the United States there is no federal regulation protecting consumers from data brokers. In fact, due to the rising interest in federal regulation, data broker firms lobbied to the tune of $29 million in the year 2020 alone.

2/6. De-anonymization techniques

Data re-identification or de-anonymization is the practice of combining datasets (such as advertising profiles) and publicly available information (such as scraped data from social media profiles) in order to discover patterns that may reveal the identities of some or all members of a dataset otherwise intended to be anonymous.

Using the 1990 census, Professor Latanya Sweeney of the Practice of Government and Technology at the Harvard Kennedy School found that up to 87% of the U.S. population can be identified using a combination of their 5-digit zip code, gender, and date of birth. [Link to the paper.]

Individuals whose datasets are re-identified are at risk of having their private information sold to organizations without their knowledge or consent. Once an individual’s privacy has been breached as a result of re-identification, future breaches become much easier: as soon as a link is made between one piece of data and a person’s real identity, that person is no longer anonymous and is at far greater risk of having their data from other sources similarly compromised.

3/6. Doxxing

Once your data has been de-anonymized, you are significantly more vulnerable to all manner of malicious activity: from scam calls and emails to identity theft to doxxing. This is of particular concern for members of minority groups who may be targeted by hate-motivated attacks.

4/6. Potential for abuse by government and law enforcement

Excerpt from “How period tracking apps and data privacy fit into a post-Roe v. Wade climate” by Rina Torchinsky for NPR:

Millions of people use apps to help track their menstrual cycles. Flo, which bills itself as the most popular period and cycle tracking app, has amassed 43 million active users. Another app, Clue, claims 12 million monthly active users. The personal health data stored in these apps is among the most intimate types of information a person can share. And it can also be telling. The apps can show when their period stops and starts and when a pregnancy stops and starts. That has privacy experts on edge because this data—whether subpoenaed or sold to a third party—could be used to suggest that someone has had or is considering an abortion. ‘We're very concerned in a lot of advocacy spaces about what happens when private corporations or the government can gain access to deeply sensitive data about people’s lives and activities,’ says Lydia X. Z. Brown, a policy counsel with the Privacy and Data Project at the Center for Democracy and Technology. ‘Especially when that data could put people in vulnerable and marginalized communities at risk for actual harm.’

Obviously Critical Role and Dropout are not collecting any sort of data related to their users’ menstrual cycles, but the thing to keep in mind is that any data that is exposed to third parties can be sold and distributed without your knowledge or consent and then be used by disinterested—or outright malicious—actors to de-anonymize your data from other sources, included potentially highly compromising data such as that collected by these period-tracking apps. Data privacy violations have compounding dangers, and should be proactively addressed wherever possible. The more of your personal data exists in the hands of third parties, the more it is to be de-anonymized.

5/6. Targeted misinformation

Data brokers are often incredibly unscrupulous actors, and will sell your data to whomever can afford to buy it, no questions asked. The most high-profile case of the consequences of this is the Facebook—Cambridge Analytica data scandal, wherein the personal data of Facebook users were acquired by Cambridge Analytica Ltd. and compiled alongside information collected from other data brokers. By giving this third-party app permission to acquire their data back in 2015, Meta (then Facebook) also gave the app access to information on their users’ friend networks: this resulted in the data of some 87 million users being collected and exploited.

The data collected by Cambridge Analytica was widely used by political strategists to influence elections and, by and large, undermine democracy around the world: While its parent company SCL had been influencing elections in developing countries for decades, Cambridge Analytica focused more on the United Kingdom and the United States. CEO Alexander Nix said the organization was involved in 44 American political races in 2014. In 2016, they worked for Donald Trump’s presidential campaign as well as for Leave.EU, one of the organisations campaigning for the United Kingdom to leave the European Union.

6/6. The Crux: Right to Privacy Violations

Even if all of the above were not concerns, every internet user should object to being arbitrarily tracked on the basis of their right to privacy. Companies should not be entitled to create and profit from personality profiles about you just because you purchased unrelated products or services from them. This right to user privacy is the central motivation behind laws like the EU’s GDPR and California’s CCPA (see Section 6).

4/7. Refuting Common Responses

1/3. “Why are you so upset? This isn’t a big deal.”

Commenter: Oh, if you’re just talking about third party cookies, that’s not a big deal … Adding a cookie to store that ‘this user clicked on a marketing email from critical role’ is hardly [worth worrying about].

Me: I don’t think you understand what tracking cookies are. They are the digital equivalent of you going to a drive through and someone from the restaurant running out of the store and sticking a GPS monitor onto your car.

Commenter: Kind of. It’s more like slapping a bumper sticker on that says, in restaurant-ese, ‘Hi I’m [name] and I went to [restaurant] once!’

This is actually an accurate correction. My metaphor was admittedly overly simplistic, but the correction specifies only so far as is comfortable for the commenter. If we want to construct a metaphor that is as accurate as possible, it would go something like this:

You drive into the McDonald’s parking lot. As you are pulling in, unbeknownst to you, a Strange Man pops out of a nearby bush (that McDonald’s has allowed him to place here deliberately for this express purpose), and sticks an invisible bumper sticker onto the back of your car. The bumper sticker is a tracker that tells the Strange Man which road you took to drive to McDonald’s, what kind of car you drive, and what (if anything) you ordered from McDonald’s while you were inside. It might also tell him where you parked in the parking lot, what music you were listening to in your car on the way in, which items you looked at on the menu and for how long, if you went to the washroom, which washroom you went into, how long you were in the washroom, and the exact location of every step you took inside the building.

Now, as soon as you leave the McDonald’s, the bumper sticker goes silent and stops being able to report information. But, let’s say next week you decide to go to the Grocery Store, and (again, unbeknownst to you), the Strange Man also has a deal with the Grocery Store. So as you’re driving into the grocery store’s parking lot, he pops out of another bush and goes to put another bumper sticker onto your car. But as he’s doing so, he notices the bumper sticker he’s already placed there a week ago that only he can see (unless you’ve done the car-equivalent of clearing your browser cache), and goes “ah, it’s Consumer #1287499290! I’ll make sure to file all of this new data under my records for Consumer #1287499290!”

You get out of your car and start to walk into the Grocery Store, but before you open the door, the Strange Man whispers to the Grocery Store: “Hey, I know you’re really trying to push your cereal right now, want me to make it more likely that this person buys some cereal from you?” and of course the Grocery Store agrees—this was the whole reason they let him set up that weird parking lot bush in the first place.

So the Strange Man runs around the store rearranging shelves. He doesn’t know your name (all the data he collects is strictly anonymous after all!) but he does know that you chose the cutesy toy for your happy meal at McDonald’s, so he changes all of the cereal packaging labels in the store to be pastel-coloured and covered in fluffy bears and unicorns. And maybe you were already going to the Grocery Store to buy cereal, and maybe you’re actually very happy to buy some cereal in a package that seems to cater specifically to your interests, but wouldn’t you feel at least a little violated if you found out that this whole process occurred without your knowledge? Especially if you felt like you could trust the people who owned the Grocery Store? They’re not really your friend or anything, but maybe you thought that they were compassionate and responsible members of the community, and part of the reason that you shopped at their store was to support that kind of business.

2/3. “Everyone does it, get over it.”

Commenter: [The marketing company working with CR] is an industry standard at this point, particularly for small businesses. Major partner of Shopify, a fairly big player. If you don't have a software development team, using industry standard solutions like these is the easy, safe option.

This sounds reasonable, but it actually makes it worse, not better, that Critical Role and Dropout are doing this. All this excuse tells me is that most businesses using Shopify (or at least the majority of those that use its recommended newsletter service) have a bush for the Strange Man set up in their parking lot.

Contracting with these businesses is certainly the easy option, but it is decidedly not the safe one.

3/3. “They need to do it for marketing reasons.”

Commenter 1: Email marketing tools like [this] use tracking to measure open and click rates. I get why you don’t want to be tracked, but it’s very hard to run a sizeable email newsletter without any user data.

Commenter 2: I work in digital marketing … every single email you get from a company has something similar to this. Guaranteed. This looks totally standard.

I am a web programmer by trade. It is my full time job. Tracking the metrics that Critical Role and Dropout are most likely interested in does not require embedding third-party tracking cookies in their fans’ web browsers. If you feel comfortable taking my word on that, feel free to skip the next section. If you’re skeptical (or if you just want to learn a little bit about how the internet works) please read on.

5/7. Tracking cookies are never necessary

We live in a technocracy. We live in a world in which technology design dictates the rules we live by. We don’t know these people, we didn’t vote for them in office, there was no debate about their design. But yet, the rules that they determine by the design decisions they make—many of them somewhat arbitrary—end up dictating how we will live our lives. —Latanya Sweeney

1/3. Definitions

A website is a combination of 2 computer programs. One of the two programs runs on your computer (laptop/desktop/phone/etc.) and the other runs on another computer somewhere in the world. The program running on your computer is the client program. The program running on the other computer is the server program.

A message sent from the client to the server is a request. A message sent from the server to the client is a response.

Cookies are bits of data that the server sends to the client in a response that the client then sends back to the server as an attachment to its subsequent requests.

A session is a series of sequential interactions between a client and server. When either of the two programs stops running (e.g. when you close a browser tab), the session is ended and any future interactions will take place in a new session.

A URL is a Uniform Resource Locator. You may also sometimes see the initialism URI—in which the ‘I’ stands for Identifier—but they effectively refer to the same thing, which is the place to find a specific thing on the internet. For our purposes, a “link” and a URL mean the same thing.

2/3. What do Critical Role and Dropout want?

These media companies (in my best estimation) are contracting with the digital advertising companies in order to get one or more of the following things:

Customer identity verification (between sessions)

Marketing campaign analytics

Customer preference profiles

Customer behaviour profiles

3/3. How can they get these things without tracking cookies?

Accounts. Dropout has an account system already. As Beacon is a thing now I have to assume Critical Role does as well, therefore this is literally already something they can do without any additional parties getting involved.

URL Query Parameters. So you want to know which of your social media feeds is driving the most traffic to your storefront. You could contract a third-party advertising company to do this for you, but as we have seen this might not be the ideal option. Instead, when posting your links to said feeds, attach a little bit of extra text to the end of the URL link so: becomes or or even These extra bits of information at the end of a URL are query parameters, and act as a way for the client to specify some instructions for the server when sending a request. In effect, a URL with query parameters allows the client to say to the server “I want this thing under these conditions”. The benefit of this approach is, of course, that you actually know precisely what information is being collected (the stuff in the parameters) and precisely what is being done with it, and you’ve avoided exposing any of your user data to third parties.

Internal data collection. Optionally associate a user’s email address with their preferences on the site. Prompt them to do this whenever they purchase anything or do any action that might benefit from having some saved preference, informing them explicitly when you do so and giving them the opportunity to opt-out.

Internal data collection. The same as above, but let the user know you are also tracking their movements while on your site. You can directly track user behaviour down to every single mouse movement if you really want to—again, no need to get an outside party involved to snoop on your fans. But you shouldn’t do that because it’s a little creepy!

At the end of the day, it will of course be more work to set up and maintain these things, and thus it will inevitably be more expensive—but that discrepancy in expense represents profit that these companies are currently making on the basis of violating their fans’ right to privacy.

6/7. Breaking the Law

The data subject shall have the right to object, on grounds relating to his or her particular situation, at any time to processing of personal data concerning him or her [...] The controller shall no longer process the personal data unless the controller demonstrates compelling legitimate grounds for the processing which override the interests, rights and freedoms of the data subject or for the establishment, exercise or defence of legal claims. Where personal data are processed for direct marketing purposes, the data subject shall have the right to object at any time to processing of personal data concerning him or her for such marketing, which includes profiling to the extent that it is related to such direct marketing. Where the data subject objects to processing for direct marketing purposes, the personal data shall no longer be processed for such purposes. At the latest at the time of the first communication with the data subject, the right referred to in paragraphs 1 and 2 shall be explicitly brought to the attention of the data subject and shall be presented clearly and separately from any other information. — General Data Protection Regulation, Art. 21

Nobody wants to break the law and be caught. I am not accusing anyone of anything and this is just my personal speculation on publicly-available information. I am not a lawyer; I merely make computer go beep-boop. If you have any factual corrections for this or any other section in this document please leave a comment and I will update the text with a revision note. Before I try my hand at the legal-adjacent stuff, allow me to wade in with the tech stuff.

Cookies are sometimes good and sometimes bad. Cookies from someone you trust are usually good. Cookies from someone you don’t know are occasionally bad. But you can take proactive measures against bad cookies. You should always default to denying any cookies that go beyond the “essential” or “functional” categorizations on any website of which you are remotely suspicious. Deny as many cookies as possible. Pay attention to what the cookie pop-ups actually say and don’t just click on the highlighted button: it is usually “Accept All”, which means that tracking and advertising cookies are fair game from the moment you click that button onward. It is illegal for companies to arbitrarily provide you a worse service for opting out of being tracked (at least it is in the EU and California).

It is my opinion (and again, I am not a legal professional, just a web developer, so take this with a grain of salt) that the links included in the newsletter emails violate both of these laws. If a user of the email newsletter residing in California or the EU wishes to visit any of the links included in said email without being tracked, they have no way of doing so. None of the actual endpoints are available in the email, effectively forcing the user to go through the third-party domain and submit themselves to being tracked in order to utilize the service they have signed up for. Furthermore, it is impossible to unsubscribe directly from within the email without also submitting to the third-party tracking.

[ID: A screenshot of the unsubscribe button in the CR newsletter alongside the page HTML which shows that the target destination for the anchor element is a trk.klclick.com page. End ID.]

As a brief aside: Opening the links in a private/incognito window is a good idea, but will not completely prevent your actions from being tracked by the advertiser. My recommendation: install uBlock Origin to warn you of tracking domains (it is a completely free and open-source project available on most major web browsers), and do not click on any links in either of these newsletters until they change their practices.

Now, it may be the case that the newsletters are shipped differently to those residing in California or the EU (if you are from either of these regions please feel free to leave a comment on whether or not this is the case), but ask yourself: does that make this any better? Sure, maybe then Critical Role and Dropout (or rather, the advertising companies they contract with) aren’t technically breaking the law, but it shows that the only thing stopping them from exploiting your personal data is potential legal repercussions, rather than any sort of commitment to your right to privacy. But I expect that the emails are not, in fact, shipping any differently in jurisdictions with more advanced privacy legislation—it wouldn’t be the first time a major tech giant blatantly flaunted EU regulations.

Without an additional browser extension such as uBlock Origin, a user clicking on the links in these emails may not even be aware that they have interacted with the advertising agency at all, let alone what sort of information that agency now has pertaining to them, nor do they have any ability to opt out of this data collection.

For more information about your right to privacy—something that only those living in the EU or California currently have—you can read explanations of the legislations at the following links (take note that these links, and all of the links embedded in this paper, are anchored directly to the destinations they purport to be, and do not sneakily pass through an additional domain before redirecting you):

7/7. Conclusion

Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by neglect, ignorance or incompetence. —Hanlon’s Razor

The important thing to make clear here is this: Even if Critical Role and Dropout are not directly selling or exploiting your personal data, they are still profiting off of it by contracting with, and receiving services from, companies whom I believe are. You may not believe me.

I do not believe that the management teams at Critical Role and Dropout are evil or malicious. Ignorance seems to be the most likely cause of this situation. Someone at some marketing company told them that this type of thing was helpful, necessary, and an industry standard, and they had no reason to doubt that person’s word. Maybe that person had no reason to doubt the word of the person who told them. Maybe there are a few people in that chain, maybe quite a few. I do not expect everyone running a company to be an expert in this stuff (hell, I’m nowhere close to being an expert in this stuff myself—I only happened to notice this at all because of a browser extension I just happened to have installed to block ads), but what I do expect is that they change their behaviour when the potential harms of their actions have been pointed out to them, which is why I have taken the time to write this.

PS. To the employees of Critical Role and Dropout

It is my understanding that these corporations were both founded with the intention of being socially responsible alongside turning a profit. By using services like the ones described above, you are, however unintentionally, profiting off of the personal datasets of your fans that are being compiled and exploited without their informed consent. You cannot say, implicitly or explicitly, “We’re not like those other evil companies! We care about more than just extracting as much money from our customers as possible!” while at the same time utilizing these services, and it is my hope that after reading this you will make the responsible choice and stop doing so.

Thank you for reading,

era

Originally Published: 23 May 2024

Last Updated: 28 May 2024

#critical role #dimension 20 #dropout #dropout tv #brennan lee mulligan #sam reich #critical role campaign 3 #cr3 #midst podcast #candela obscura #make some noise #game changer #smarty pants #very important people #web security #data privacy #gdpr #ccpa #open letter

9 notes · View notes

allthecanadianpolitics · 2 years ago

Text

Federal public sector workers’ wages, adjusted for inflation, are no better than they were in 2007, a new report from the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives shows.

“The average federal public sector worker’s wages only buy the same today as they did in October 2007,” the CCPA report states. “No other industry—none—has seen average inflation adjusted wages pushed back as far as federal public sector workers.”

Over 100,000 federal public workers hit the picket lines across the country on Wednesday with a two-year expired contract and no wage offers that kept up with the rising cost of living.

Even if the union wins its current wage demands of 4.5% increases each year for three years, “those average federal worker wages would still be 4.8 per cent below the industrial average,” the report notes.

Full article

Tagging: @politicsofcanada

#cdnpoli #canadian politics #canadian news #canada #canadian #workers rights #wages #federal public workers #federal public sector #federal employees #unions #strikes #strike action #CCPA #canadian centre for policy alternatives

88 notes · View notes

shiverandqueeef · 1 year ago

Text

i haven't really seen this being addressed (which could just be the result of it not being discussed within my particular tumblr circle) but I'm wondering if it's not a potential issue for new tumblr users to be joining via their google accounts.

signing up through google wasn't an option for tumblr for a long time and tbh i don't know when that changed, but everytime i go to sign in via email and the little pop up box asks me if i want to sign in via google or facebook i just. well i see fucking red bc jfc the absolute chokehold of a monopoly this one god forsaken company has on the internet is horrific, but also i just don't know enough about tumblr and/or google tos/current laws in the states (where tumblr is based) to know if connecting your blog to a google account is giving them access to data mine on this site

i'll do my own research but if anyone who is more educated on this feels like jumping in i would super appreciate it

#google #data collection #data mining #cyber security #data privacy #gdpr #ccpa

2 notes · View notes

jcmarchi · 11 days ago

Text

10 Best AI SDR Tools (October 2024)

New Post has been published on https://thedigitalinsider.com/10-best-ai-sdr-tools-october-2024/

10 Best AI SDR Tools (October 2024)

The landscape of sales development is undergoing a transformation, powered by artificial intelligence that’s redefining how businesses connect with potential customers. AI SDRs (Sales Development Representatives) have emerged as sophisticated systems that automate and enhance the traditional role of human SDRs, handling everything from initial prospecting and lead qualification to scheduling appointments and managing follow-ups.

As businesses increasingly recognize the value of these AI-powered tools in scaling personalized outreach and maintaining consistent engagement across multiple channels, the market has responded with innovative solutions that combine advanced machine learning with practical sales automation. In this guide, we’ll explore the best AI SDR tools available, examining how they’re helping organizations streamline their sales processes while maintaining the personal touch that’s crucial for successful customer relationships.

Laxis stands at the forefront of AI-powered sales development, revolutionizing how businesses approach lead generation and qualification. At its core, the platform leverages a vast global database of over 700 million contacts, ensuring that sales teams have access to an unprecedented pool of potential prospects. What sets Laxis apart is its sophisticated approach to automating the entire sales development process, from initial contact identification to personalized outreach execution.

The platform’s standout feature is its hyper-personalization capability, which goes beyond basic automation to craft individually tailored communications for each prospect. By analyzing prospect data and behavior patterns, Laxis creates engaging outreach campaigns that resonate with potential customers. The platform also includes an innovative AI Cold Calling feature that maintains natural, human-like interactions while scaling voice outreach efforts.

Key Features:

Automated lead generation and qualification through AI-powered prospect analysis

Hyper-personalized email creation using advanced natural language processing

AI Cold Calling with human-like interactions for scaled voice outreach

Real-time analytics and optimization for campaign performance

Seamless CRM integration for streamlined workflow management

Visit Laxis →

Alisha by Floworks represents a significant leap forward in AI SDR technology, powered by its proprietary ThorV2 engine. This innovative platform has demonstrated remarkable capabilities, outperforming traditional Large Language Models (LLMs) like GPT-4 and Claude-3 with an impressive 90.1% accuracy rate and 27.5% faster latency, all while maintaining superior cost-effectiveness.

The platform’s efficiency stems from its sophisticated research capabilities, which scan across 180 web sources to create deeply personalized outreach campaigns. This comprehensive approach to data gathering and analysis enables Alisha to craft messages that truly resonate with prospects, leading to higher engagement rates and more successful conversions.

Key Features:

Multichannel outreach capabilities spanning email, LinkedIn, and hybrid approaches

In-depth research across 180 web sources for enhanced personalization

Full end-to-end automation of the sales development process

Dynamic self-training capability for continuous improvement

Intelligent response system for real-time prospect engagement

Visit Alisha bt Floworks →

AiSDR delivers a comprehensive solution for businesses looking to streamline their entire sales outreach process through advanced automation and personalization. This versatile platform stands out for its ability to manage both outbound and inbound marketing strategies effectively, providing a unified approach to sales development that adapts to various business needs.

The platform’s strength lies in its intelligent lead engagement system, which uses insights from previous interactions to address common objections and guide prospects toward booking calls with sales representatives. This adaptive approach, combined with automated lead scoring and qualification, ensures that sales teams can focus their energy on conducting meetings with the most promising prospects.

Key Features:

AI-generated personalized email campaigns with dynamic content adaptation

Multi-channel outreach support for comprehensive prospect engagement

Intelligent lead engagement and scoring for optimal prioritization

Automated content generation based on proven sales frameworks

Advanced booking optimization with integrated scheduling capabilities

Visit AiSDR →

Gong has established itself as a leading Revenue Intelligence platform and AI SDR, leveraging advanced AI technology specifically designed for revenue teams. The platform’s sophisticated approach to sales intelligence is built on over 40 proprietary AI models, trained on billions of high-quality sales interactions. This deep learning foundation enables Gong to provide unparalleled analysis of customer interactions across various channels.

What truly distinguishes Gong is its comprehensive approach to generative AI applications in sales. The platform goes beyond simple conversation analysis, automatically generating critical insights from customer interactions, including pain points, outcomes, and actionable next steps. This allows sales teams to quickly implement strategic changes based on data-driven observations rather than just reviewing call recordings.

Key Features:

40+ specialized AI models built on billions of sales interactions

Generative AI insights for automated analysis and recommendations

Custom Active Learning Models for trend identification

Multilingual capabilities for global team coordination

Enterprise-grade security with robust data protection

Visit Gong →

Ava by Artisan represents the next evolution in AI SDR tools, functioning as a sophisticated digital worker capable of managing complex sales development tasks autonomously. With access to over 300 million B2B contacts, Ava transforms how businesses approach prospecting and lead engagement, offering a level of automation that significantly reduces manual workload while maintaining personalized interactions.

The platform’s true strength lies in its ability to operate in full autopilot mode while maintaining high-quality personalization. Ava conducts individual research on each prospect before crafting targeted outreach messages, ensuring that every interaction is relevant and engaging. This combination of automation and personalization allows sales teams to scale their efforts without sacrificing the quality of their outreach.

Key Features:

Automated prospecting with enriched demographic data

Hyper-personalized outreach based on individual prospect research

Multi-channel approach across email and LinkedIn

Built-in email warmup for optimal deliverability

Automated follow-ups with intelligent timing optimization

Visit Ava by Artisan →

Humantic offers an innovative approach to AI-powered sales development by focusing on the psychological aspects of buyer-seller relationships. The platform stands out for its innovative Personality AI Assistant, which combines advanced disciplines including psycholinguistics, computational psychometrics, I/O psychology, and neuroscience with cutting-edge machine learning to provide unprecedented insights into prospect behavior and preferences.

What truly sets Humantic apart is its ability to analyze a prospect’s digital footprint and generate detailed DISC personality profiles, enabling SDRs to tailor their approach before the first interaction. The platform’s “1-click personalization” feature transforms this psychological insight into actionable communication strategies, allowing sales teams to craft highly personalized outreach that resonates with each prospect’s unique personality type and decision-making style.

Key Features:

Advanced Personality AI Assistant powered by multiple scientific disciplines

DISC profile generation from digital footprint analysis

1-click personalization for tailored communications

Chrome extension for real-time prospect insights

Seamless integration with major CRM and sales platforms

Visit Humantic →

Cognism distinguishes itself in the AI SDR landscape through its unwavering focus on data quality and compliance across global markets. The platform’s Diamond Verified Phone Data® technology sets a new standard for contact accuracy, while its commitment to GDPR and CCPA compliance ensures that sales teams can operate confidently in various regulatory environments.

The platform’s innovative approach to AI-powered search, utilizing ChatGPT-style textual and voice prompts, simplifies the prospecting process while maintaining precision. Cognism enables sales teams to identify and prioritize warm leads who are actively searching for solutions, significantly improving conversion rates.

Key Features:

Diamond Verified Phone Data® for enhanced contact accuracy

AI-powered search with intuitive ChatGPT-style prompts

Intent data powered by Bombora for lead prioritization

Automated data enrichment for comprehensive prospect profiles

Sales trigger event tracking for timely outreach

Visit Cognism →

Outreach has established itself as a powerhouse in the sales engagement space by combining sophisticated AI capabilities with comprehensive workflow automation. The platform’s approach to sales execution goes beyond basic automation, leveraging artificial intelligence to analyze buyer sentiment and intent in email replies, automatically classifying responses and guiding sales teams toward the most effective next steps.

What sets Outreach apart is its multichannel sequencing capability, allowing sales teams to create and execute coordinated campaigns across email, phone, SMS, and social media. This integrated approach, powered by AI-driven analytics and insights, enables organizations to maintain consistent messaging while adapting their outreach strategy based on real-time engagement data and prospect behavior.

Key Features:

Multichannel sequences with AI-optimized coordination

AI-powered sentiment analysis for response classification

Advanced email capabilities with stakeholder management

Integrated call and meeting scheduling system

Automated data sync with major CRM platforms

Visit Outreach →

11x.ai is pioneering the future of sales development with Alice, an autonomous AI-powered SDR. This platform represents a paradigm shift in how businesses approach outbound sales, leveraging massive datasets and advanced AI to create a digital worker capable of replacing traditional, disjointed sales tools with streamlined, automated workflows. Having processed trillions of bytes of data and analyzed over 500 million leads, Alice brings scale and precision to sales development operations.

Key Features:

Autonomous lead sourcing and qualification from vast data sources

Multi-channel prospect engagement with personalized messaging

AI-powered meeting scheduling and follow-up automation

Comprehensive workflow automation and integration capabilities

Visit 11x.ai →

LeadSend stands out in the AI SDR landscape as a purpose-built solution focused on automating the most time-consuming aspects of lead generation and qualification. The platform’s distinctive approach leverages advanced AI algorithms to automate up to 90% of manual lead generation tasks, representing a significant leap forward in sales development efficiency. This high level of automation enables sales teams to redirect their energy from routine prospecting to high-value interactions that directly impact revenue.

The platform’s sophisticated AI engine excels at identifying and qualifying leads that precisely match a company’s ideal customer profile, ensuring that outreach efforts are consistently targeted at the most promising prospects. LeadSend’s intelligent system goes beyond basic automation by optimizing every aspect of the outreach process, from crafting personalized messages to determining the optimal timing for email sends, while continuously learning and adapting based on response patterns and engagement data.

Key Features:

AI-powered lead research and qualification system

Automated personalized email outreach optimization

Intelligent send-time optimization

Response analysis and automatic lead qualification

Continuous learning and strategy refinement capabilities

Visit LeadSend →

Why Use an AI SDR?

The transformation of the sales landscape through AI-powered SDR tools represents a pivotal shift in how sales teams approach their outreach efforts and lead generation strategies. With 81% of sales teams either experimenting with or having fully implemented AI, it’s clear that artificial intelligence has moved from a competitive advantage to a necessary foundation for modern sales development. These sophisticated platforms are revolutionizing the sales process by automating repetitive tasks while maintaining the personal touch crucial for building customer relationships. By leveraging artificial intelligence, sales development representatives can now focus on high-value activities that directly impact revenue, while AI handles everything from data entry and lead qualification to personalized outreach and automated follow-ups.

The impact of AI SDR tools on sales performance is significant and measurable. Sales teams implementing these solutions report generating more qualified leads, shortened sales cycles, and improved closing rates. Through automated sales workflows and intelligent lead scoring, sales professionals can make data-driven decisions based on real-time insights and accurate sales forecasts. This enhanced efficiency allows sales reps to prioritize leads effectively, customize their outreach strategy across multiple channels, and focus on building meaningful customer relationships rather than getting bogged down in manual tasks.

1 note · View note

stacylazzaro · 3 months ago

Text

youtube

Today, we dispel the myth that artificial intelligence (AI) is overhyped by showing how it is revolutionizing eCommerce. The movie demonstrates how AI-powered systems like Buyist Pro can quickly analyze difficult circumstances, give actionable insights, and ease problem-solving for non-technical people. It uses the scenario of a small business owner dealing with a customer's allegation of a data breach. Artificial intelligence (AI) can interpret natural language questions and provide pertinent, context-aware answers, improving the usability and efficiency of eCommerce systems.

0 notes

mistpodfics · 1 month ago

Text

Codes and Bots written by ziazippy5379 | @theredshirtsarecoming

A Leverage Podfic read by mistbornhero for CCPA

Alec teaches Breanna her first bit of coding.

Podfic Length: 10:43 minutes

#Leverage #Podfic #Length: 10 - 20 minutes #CCPA #CCPA 2024 #Breanna Casey & Alec Hardison #Alec Hardison

3 notes · View notes

kbirbpods · 1 month ago

Text

[Podfic Link] | Length: 7 minutes, 9 seconds

Original Work: as if he has saved all mankind by suzukiblu

DPxDC: Danny Fenton/Duke Thomas | Rating: General Audiences

Summary:

Duke found something weird on patrol today. He’s day shift, obviously, but near the end of his shift . . . Well, something weird happened. Or he saw something weird, more like.

Notes: my first Ghostlights podfic!

Recorded for the Chromatic Characters Podfic Anthology V with the theme of "family."

& I know that any of my podfics for the anthology could fit the "character of color" slot for my podfic bingo but I love this one so much that I wanted to highlight it! You can find my bingo card here ⋆˙⟡♡

#ghostlights #dpxdc #dp x dc #dp x dc crossover #danny fenton #duke thomas #danny phantom podfic #dpxdc podfic #dc podfic #batfam podfic #ccpa #ccpa 2024 #chromatic characters #chromatic characters podfic anthology #chromatic characters podfic anthology V #kbirb pods #suzukiblu

7 notes · View notes

eraepoch · 6 months ago

Text

Emerging Media Companies, Tracking Cookies, and Data Privacy (An Open Letter to Dropout and Critical Role)

Read the open letter here.

TL;DR:

Both Critical Role (CR) and Dropout are exclusively using links provided by third-party digital marketing solution companies in their email newsletters.

Every link in each of the newsletters (even the unsubscribe link) goes through a third-party domain which is flagged as a tracking server by the uBlock Origin browser extension.

IMO these advertising companies (and perhaps CR/Dropout by proxy) might be breaking the law in the EU and California by violating the GDPR and CCPA respectively.

They should stop.

#critical role #dropout #dimension 20 #game changer #sam reich #data privacy #gdpr #ccpa #open letter

9 notes · View notes

jcmarchi · 11 days ago

Text

Ajay Kumar, CEO of SLK Software – Interview Series

New Post has been published on https://thedigitalinsider.com/ajay-kumar-ceo-of-slk-software-interview-series/

Ajay Kumar, CEO of SLK Software – Interview Series

Ajay Kumar is the CEO of SLK Software. Ajay is passionate about making a positive client impact while leading P&L’s across all verticals of SLK. An industry veteran, Ajay brings an entrepreneurial conviction, to grow and scale the business performance and give back to the community.

SLK’s AI-powered platforms and accelerators are designed to automate and streamline processes, helping businesses reach the market more quickly. These solutions, ranging from data governance to self-service APIs, aim to support the rapid launch of innovations.

How does the EverythingAI platform assist organizations in accelerating their digital transformation, particularly in sectors like banking, insurance, and manufacturing?

EverythingAITM is tailored to address the unique challenges and demands of the banking, insurance, and manufacturing industries, providing specialized AI solutions that drive efficiency, accuracy, and innovation. Here is the suite of solutions that EverythingAITM offers:

Banking:

AI significantly enhances banking processes by streamlining tasks like customer onboarding through automated document extraction, which reduces manual effort and speeds up account creation. In mortgage requisition intake, AI optimizes efficiency by automating the analysis of requisition data, leading to faster processing times. Fraud detection has become more robust with advanced AI algorithms that help identify and prevent fraudulent activities, thereby safeguarding assets and reducing risks. In wealth management, AI automates asset identification, improving the accuracy and speed of collateral processing. Additionally, sentiment analysis is leveraged to provide deeper insights for smart lending, enhancing customer satisfaction and reducing the likelihood of loan defaults.

Insurance:

In the insurance sector, AI is transforming operations through solutions like submission intake automation, which streamlines workflows and reduces processing time. AI-driven insights assist underwriters by offering accurate risk assessments and personalized recommendations, improving the efficiency and accuracy of underwriting decisions. Sentiment analysis also plays a crucial role in gauging customer feedback, helping insurers refine their service offerings and build stronger customer relationships. AI enhances the First Notice of Loss (FNOL) process by detecting and assessing damage, leading to faster claims processing. Additionally, it simplifies the management of endorsements and the onboarding of new participants, reducing administrative burdens and improving turnaround times.

Manufacturing:

In manufacturing, AI automates product configuration processes, enabling faster customization and more efficient production planning. The technology facilitates the seamless translation of technical documents and manuals, allowing global operations to communicate more effectively. Additionally, AI-driven quote generation with customization speeds up the sales process, enhancing customer satisfaction by providing tailored quotes more efficiently.

These tailored AI solutions enable the banking, insurance, and manufacturing industries to overcome their specific challenges, drive greater efficiency, improve accuracy, and enhance the overall customer experience.

What are the key benefits of using SLK’s Data Artistry feature for real-time decision-making and operational efficiency?

SLK’s Data Artistry is a powerful tool that enhances data capabilities and streamlines processes to deliver superior actionable insights. Its key features include Automated Data Exploration and Profiling, significantly reducing the time and effort required to analyze and comprehend data. The AI-Powered Model Building feature enables users to rapidly develop predictive and prescriptive models, leading to a 77% acceleration in time to value. Additionally, Interactive Visualizations and Reports simplify the interpretation and sharing of insights, contributing to a 40% reduction in analysis time. The platform’s Zero-Code Workbench-based solution empowers users to create sophisticated analytics solutions without requiring extensive coding knowledge, further boosting productivity by 40%. With these capabilities, the DA platform ensures that organizations can achieve faster, more accurate decision-making and optimize strategies for improved business outcomes.

Can you elaborate on how the Quote AI tool improves quoting processes for businesses?

The platform revolutionizes the quoting process for businesses by utilizing advanced AI technologies to automate what has traditionally been a labor-intensive and error-prone task. This automation begins with Data Extraction, employing OCR and AI to efficiently process customer emails and extract relevant information. Data Sufficiency Validation ensures that all necessary data is accurately captured, minimizing the risk of errors or omissions. The platform then proceeds with Automatic Quote Generation, streamlining the process to deliver rapid and precise quotes, significantly reducing response times.

Additionally, it enhances customer engagement through Follow-Up Automation, ensuring timely interactions that boost customer satisfaction. It also features Email Draft Generation and Automated Email Monitoring, further optimizing communication efficiency.

How does SentiX leverage sentiment analysis to enhance customer experiences, and what are the real-world applications of this technology?

With SentiX, we recognize the crucial role customer feedback plays in shaping business decisions and experiences. In a time where online reviews and real-time interactions impact public perception, understanding this feedback is more important than ever. SentiX, our advanced sentiment analysis tool, turns vast amounts of customer data—whether written reviews or live speech—into actionable insights. It doesn’t just process feedback; it interprets the emotions and attitudes behind it, offering businesses a deeper understanding of customer sentiments.

SentiX analyzes feedback across domains and can be tailored to suit specific business needs. Its real-time analysis allows immediate responses to customer concerns, enhancing satisfaction and loyalty. What truly sets SentiX apart is its ability to track sentiment trends over time, helping businesses identify emerging issues or opportunities proactively. Whether improving customer service or refining products, SentiX enables data-driven decisions.

In specialized applications like financial services, SentiX can incorporate public sentiment into lending decisions, reducing risk and improving loan portfolio quality. By leveraging SentiX, businesses can turn feedback into strategic actions, staying competitive and responsive in a constantly evolving market.

With your background in growing technology businesses, how do you see platforms like EverythingAITM contributing to the future of AI-driven business models?-

EverythingAITM is more than just a platform; it’s a comprehensive suite of solutions, platforms, and accelerators designed to support enterprises in their journey toward becoming AI-driven organizations. This suite offers a holistic approach to integrating AI, addressing various aspects of business transformation. Whether it’s through specialized platforms, advanced AI tools, or accelerators that speed up implementation, EverythingAITM equips businesses with the necessary resources to seamlessly transition to AI-led enterprise.

How does EverythingAITM address the challenges organizations face in AI adoption, and what strategies are key to overcoming those hurdles?

EverythingAITM offers a comprehensive approach to AI adoption, guiding enterprises through each stage—from conceptualizing AI ideas to full deployment and optimization. This structured methodology ensures that AI technologies deliver measurable business outcomes aligned with strategic goals.

One of the biggest challenges in AI adoption is integrating AI with diverse, often legacy, IT systems. EverythingAITM addresses this by offering seamless integration solutions that fit within existing infrastructures, ensuring data governance and privacy without disruption. A key component is the Enterprise Workbench, an industry- and LLM-agnostic tool that eliminates AI “hallucinations” by providing a controlled environment for developing contextual solutions on platforms like Mithril and Dexter.

By overcoming integration complexities and offering a structured, end-to-end solution, EverythingAITM enables organizations to harness AI’s full potential, driving growth and innovation.

In your experience with AI-driven solutions, how does EverythingAI’s full lifecycle support help businesses from strategy development to optimization? Reply:

EverythingAITM’s full lifecycle support is crafted to help organizations overcome AI adoption challenges, ensuring better outcomes in productivity, customer experience, decision-making, and business reimagination. The journey starts with the Envision phase, where organizations receive AI Strategy Advisory, AI Maturity Assessment, and AI Governance frameworks. This stage aligns AI efforts with business objectives and regulatory standards, while tools like GitHub Copilot Consulting and GenAI Literacy Bootcamp prepare teams for AI.

In the Engineer phase, EverythingAITM transforms concepts into scalable solutions, integrating AI into core operations through AI and Data Architecture, GenAI Development, and AI/ML Modeling. Tools like AIWiz and PeakPerform automate tasks and enable faster decision-making.

In the Expand phase, AI initiatives scale through LLMOps, AI COE Setup, and Responsible AI Implementation, embedding AI into the enterprise to drive innovative outcomes.

The Evolve phase focuses on continuous improvement, with Process Reimagination and Sustainable AI practices driving long-term growth and competitive advantage.

Can you explain how SLK’s AI-powered solutions, like TrackShieldAI and PeakPerform, drive efficiency and productivity in manufacturing?

AI-powered solutions like TrackShieldAI and PeakPerform play distinct yet critical roles in driving efficiency and productivity in the manufacturing industry.

TrackShieldAI enhances safety and operational efficiency by utilizing advanced AI for real-time tracking and monitoring of personnel in industrial environments. This solution provides comprehensive insights and automated alerts, enabling companies to ensure workforce safety, optimize workflows, and respond promptly to emergencies. By seamlessly integrating with existing systems, TrackShieldAI reduces the need for manual monitoring, creating a safer and more efficient working environment.

Meanwhile, PeakPerform focuses on optimizing Application and Infrastructure Managed Services using AI and ML technologies. This intelligent platform leverages actionable intelligence from both historical and real-time data to predict machine inefficiencies, auto-optimize operations, and prevent potential issues. By minimizing human intervention and providing real-time alerts, PeakPerform ensures precision in executing transformation programs and maintaining operational efficiency. Its ability to deliver actionable insights and focus on beyond-ticket elimination enhances productivity, enabling businesses to achieve their desired outcomes more effectively.

Both TrackShieldAI and PeakPerform, with their unique capabilities, contribute significantly to improving efficiency and productivity in manufacturing, addressing critical aspects of safety, operational management, and infrastructure optimization.

How does SLK Software ensure responsible AI implementation with EverythingAI, especially in regulated industries like finance and insurance?

SLK ensures responsible AI implementation in regulated industries like finance and insurance through several key practices:

Compliance with Regulations: SLK tailors its AI solutions to meet stringent regulatory requirements, ensuring compliance with data privacy laws (e.g., GDPR, CCPA) and industry regulations (e.g., FINRA, SEC, IRDAI) by embedding necessary safeguards in its platforms.

Explainability & Transparency: The company develops localized and explainable AI systems. In scrutinized decision-making environments, outputs are designed to be transparent, fostering trust and accountability among stakeholders.

Ethical AI Framework: SLK employs an ethical AI framework that incorporates bias detection and mitigation strategies to ensure fair outcomes.

Human Oversight & Governance: SLK integrates a human-in-the-loop (HITL) approach in critical applications, allowing experts to review AI-generated insights to align with industry standards and ethical practices.

Risk Management & Monitoring: Continuous monitoring and risk management processes are established to detect anomalies in AI models. Regular audits and updates ensure AI solutions remain robust and compliant with the evolving regulatory landscape.

Customer Data Protection: Prioritizing data security, SLK uses advanced encryption methods and secure protocols to safeguard sensitive customer information, essential in finance and insurance.

Through these practices, SLK ensures that its AI solutions are innovative, responsible, and compliant in highly regulated environments.

Thank you for the great interview, readers who wish to learn more should visit SLK Software.

0 notes