This is primarily for our readers in the UK, but it's part of a growing trend that should concern Internet users everywhere. Phorm is a notorious advertising system that tracks the browsing activities of customers of huge companies like BT (a major British ISP) and Virgin Media. The data is collected and used to sell targeted advertising, which has a lot of people up in arms over privacy concerns.

Information rights activists aren't known for sitting idle when their privacy is threatened by spyware, and that's where AntiPhormLite comes in. The program, available for Windows XP and Vista, runs as a standalone up or within a second browser of your choice. It calls web pages on its own, generating a fake trail of browsing activity that should make Phorm's data completely useless. AntiPhormLite won't hit your bandwidth, because it only grabs the HTML from each page it hits, leaving out the heavy stuff like Flash, and avoiding any dangerous executables.

You can run AntiPhormLite as a standalone app or within a second browser of your choice. The AntiPhormLite has a thorough, and entertaining, FAQ that should address any concerns you might have about running the app. Our favorite bit? "Just run it and go and watch TV if you want. Someone somewhere will assume you like to shop for red shoes and caravans and be rubbing their hands with glee."

[via BoingBoing]