Personalized advertising is possible by tracking consumers' online activities and customizing ads for individual consumers. These ads are often more relevant, interesting, and appreciated by the consumer. However, there is a sense of worry about how personal information is gathered, stored, and used. While companies share the information with each other, consumers worry that the collection and usage of their personal information may damage their personal privacy. The personalization-privacy paradox describes this relationship between appreciated personalized advertising and breaches of privacy. The purpose of this study is to explore what elements of personalized marketing consumers find to be a breach of their personal privacy. By analyzing earlier research and literature, a theoretical framework was developed. The study uses a qualitative method utilizing semi-structured interviews to collect empirical data, which is then analyzed using the theoretical framework. The findings show that there are four primary elements in personalized advertising that consumers find to be a breach of privacy. These are recurring ads, feelings of being watched, personal information being shared and covert data collection. / Individanpassad marknadsföring är möjligt genom att spåra konsumenters onlineaktivitet och anpassa reklam för individuella konsumenter. Denna reklam är ofta mer relevant, intressant och uppskattad av konsumenten. Det finns dock en känsla av oro om hur personlig information samlas in, lagras och används. Medan företag delar informationen med varandra oroar sig konsumenter för att insamlingen och användandet av deras personliga information kan kränka deras personliga integritet. Personalization-privacy paradox beskriver detta samband mellan uppskattad individanpassad marknadsföring och kränkningar av den personliga integriteten. Syftet med denna studie är att undersöka vilka element av individanpassad marknadsföring konsumenter upplever som integritetskränkande. Genom att analysera tidigare forskning och litteratur skapades ett teoretiskt ramverk. Studien använde sig av semistrukturerade intervjuer för att samla in empiriska data, som sedan analyserades med hjälp av det teoretiska ramverket. Resultaten visar att det finns fyra huvudsakliga element i individanpassad marknadsföring som konsumenter anser vara integritetskränkande. Dessa är återkommande reklam, känslan av att vara övervakad, delande av personlig information och hemlig datainsamling.

As society progresses towards a more algorithmic era, the influence of artificial intelligence (AI) is driving a revolution in the digital landscape. At its core, AI applications aim to engage customers by providing carefully tailored and data-driven personalization and customization of products, services, and marketing mix elements. However, the adoption of AI, while promising enhanced personalization, poses challenges due to the increased collection, analysis, and control of consumer data by technology owners. Consequently, concerns over data privacy have emerged as a primary consideration for individuals. This paper delves deeper into the implications of the personalization- privacy paradox, aiming to provide a comprehensive analysis of the challenges and opportunities it presents. The purpose of this thesis is to understand users’ privacy concerns and willingness to disclose their personal information to AI technologies by addressing the limitations of previous research and utilizing qualitative methods to gain a more in-depth understanding of consumer views. To understand users’ privacy concerns and willingness to disclose personal information to AI technologies, a qualitative approach was followed. Combining a deductive and inductive approach to fulfill the purpose of the study, empirical data was collected through 20 semi- structured interviews. The participants were chosen using a purposive sampling technique. Users’ privacy concerns and willingness to disclose personal information to AI technologies differ significantly. It depends not only on the individual, but also on the type of AI technology, the company providing the AI technology, the possibility of obtaining additional benefits, and whether the company is transparent about its data collection and can provide proof of security.

Social networking sites are channels that allow companies to appeal to their target audience through personalized advertising which has become an increasingly common way for companies to reach their target customers. Personalization is possible through the use of customer data which allows designing an advertisement based on individual consumers' preferences benefiting the consumers with more personally appealing advertisements. However, the collection of the data has led to consumers’ experiencing costs from the personalization involving concerns for the safety of personal information. Because of the tension between benefits and costs of personalization, consumers' behavior has become paradoxical. The consumers’ behaviour does not always correspond to their concerns by which the consumers trade off their privacy to receive benefits from the personalization in return. With that said, this study aims to explore how the personalization privacy paradox appears in the consumers’ response to personalized advertisements on social networking sites by assessing their perception of the benefits and costs of personalized advertisements. Semi-structured interviews of eight participants lead to the main findings of this research identifying four factors that have an impact on consumers’ interaction with the advertisement; (1) simplified purchase decisions, (2) personal interest, (3) personal gain, and (4) trustworthiness. In addition, the research revealed additional findings indicating that consumers' concern for data collection could be changing from privacy risks regarding themselves to concerns about the consequence of data collection on a societal level. Furthermore, the findings show an indication for an emerging dilemma of personalized advertising for companies to overcome. Finally, this research provides implications for both academia as well as practitioners.

Digital marketing is constantly adapting and evolving in line with technological advances. One of these advances is the digitalization, which has given rise to Programmatic Advertising (PA). In order to practice PA, the companies need to collect data about consumers' preferences and personal interests. On the other hand, consumers have a need to protect their privacy. The needs of these two parties cross each other which creates the tension, called the Personalization-privacy paradox. In this study, we intend to investigate consumers' attitudes towards PA and whether personalization gives rise to improved browsing experiences or evenviolates their privacy. A quantitative study was conducted, where the independent variable was called Personalization and the dependent variables - Attractiveness, Annoyance, Invasiveness and Trade-off. The results of bivariate regression analysis showed that all of the dependent variables of the study were statistically significant. The results also illustrated that the majority of the respondents experienced PA ads as beneficial, but also invasive. These results are in line with the Utility maximization theory, as PA ads were considered both beneficial and risky. Therefore, consumers would have incentives to disclose their personal information as long as the percieved benefits would outweigh perceived risks, generated by PA. We concluded that there are no clear, predetermined answers to what attitudes consumers have towards PA, but this can vary from case to case, which is in line with both the Privacy calculus theory and the Utility maximization theory. This involves a risk-benefit analysis, performed by consumers, where perceived benefits exceeding perceived risks would generate positive attitudes and vice versa