UK 13:57 Monday, 26 October 2026
Breaking news and expert analysis on fast-moving AIM and LSE listed shares
Disclosure: I have no positions in any stocks mentioned, and no plans to initiate any positions within the next 72 hours. I wrote this article myself, and it expresses my own opinions. I am not receiving compensation for it (other than from ShareProphets). I have no business relationship with any company whose stock is mentioned in this article.
In every country that Phorm (PHRM) operates in, the story is the same: initial excitement and share ramping, placing to fund mammoth cashburn, public outcry over its spyware and eventual closure. Now it's time that Phorm told us the truth about Turkey.
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Comments
wildrides
From what you say it seems they have Phorm Guv .
BTCustomer
I see you have removed the final paragraph from your article which suggested an association between Phorm and Fideo.com
The evidence from robtex shows a clear association between Phorm and fideo.com and fideocrv.com as shown here:
https://www.robtex.com/en/advisory/dns/com/fideo/
https://www.robtex.com/en/advisory/dns/com/fideocrv/
with clear references to:
91.205.220.0/22 91.205.220.0/24 VeriSign Customer Route PHORM-NET Phorm UK Inc
and
173.240.4.0/22 Centrilogic Buffalo Data Center CENTRILOGIC-PHORM-173.240.4.224 Phorm
The WHOIS domain registration for fideo.com and fideocrv.com is anonymous/concealed and therefore it is not possible to state ownership. In the past it has usually been Phorm’s partner ISP’s who have “owned” domains like gezinti.com or moodoo.com.cn, used as “landing pages” for the Phorm ad-behavioural targeting product, rather than Phorm itself, and it has, up to now, been Phorm’s partner ISPs that have been fined when national comms regulators have cracked down on their activity (for example, Oi in Brazil, RomTelecom in Romania, TTNET in Turkey, who all had to pay substantial financial penalties because of their association with Phorm). Maybe that’s why the $1.6m of “invoiced revenue” from the Brazilian operations never actually made it into Phorm’s accounts at the end of the day – did it have to be offset against the $1.59m fine by the Brazilian authorities?
Of course how the Chinese, with their current concerns about cybersecurity, will view the prospect of Chinese citizens browsing data passing through or residing on either USA or UK based servers, remains to be seen. Not too sure the Russians will be very keen to see Phorm’s iMarker data travelling abroad either.
BTCustomer
One other possibility is that fideo.com, fideocrv.com and the brand name “Fideo” are being reserved for the USA market. This advert for example, referring to the US market, is for a London/Soho based job using phraseology identical to phrases found on the Phorm company site – http://phorm.com website,
http://www.reed.co.uk/jobs/targeting-specialist-suitable-for-a-graduate/26461743#/jobs/private/o416508
Compare this phrase for example, on the Reed ad for an “American Targeting Specialist” a to phraseology on the Phorm website
“A global personalisation technology company that makes content and advertising more relevant to consumers. Our innovative platform delivers a more interesting online experience, with industry-leading privacy standards. Our partners include leading Internet service providers (ISPs), Publishers, Ad Networks and Advertisers.”
Looks like a Phorm advert to me, aimed at the US market. Phorm left the USA before their UK adventure in 2008, when they were involved with hotel Wifi using very similar methodology to NebuAd, Deep Packet Inspection at a network level, to facilitate behavioural ad targeting. The US authorities (FCC) were not happy about such methods then. No wonder Phorm are recruiting anonymously, and looking at yet another “fresh” untainted brand name in Fideo.