Mark Cuban, technology’s favorite son billionaire investor, has just joined up with other investors who spent $5 million on startup BlueCava. The company expects to develop a “unique fingerprinting” technology for all devices, allowing a device to be uniquely identified when networked with others. They suggest that this technology can be used to better target advertisements and reduce fraud—by replacing online tracking tools such as cookies. (Can anyone say: privacy concerns and cloning/spoofing?)

The Wall Street Journal Digits blog clues us in,

BlueCava hopes that its device identification system may eventually replace online tracking tools such as cookies. Instead, BlueCava hopes companies will track users based on their device IDs. Consumers will be able to visit BlueCava to see how they are being tracked and to choose not to be tracked.

“We represent a brand new way to disclose to consumers how they can receive targeted advertising,” said BlueCava Chief Executive David Norris. “Some people view us as the next generation of technology that will extend beyond what cookies can do.”

See how they’re being tracked and choose not to be tracked. Wouldn’t most customers do this by not installing or activating the BlueCava technology? While they suggest that they can do more than cookies can they’re not actually saying anything. What BlueCava is suggesting does exactly what cookies do already—they’re just suggesting that their cookie will be ever-persistent and only operable with their network.

I don’t understand why $5 million worth of investors feel that this project will go anywhere. It certainly has all the glitter and glitz necessary to look good, but it’s going to depend heavily on customer adoption and developer/network sign on. Cookies are already the mainstay of every browser, they don’t require a particular network, and they enhance customer privacy by permitting the customer to directly control what comes and goes from their device (via the browser).

Certainly marketers and service providers want to trust that they’re always sending to the same device, they want to lock customers down so that they must work with them to move between devices rather than just doing it on the fly. Right now it looks like BlueCava goes beyond cookies only in offloading control and transparency from the device (and the consumer) onto themselves.

Mark Cuban says he sees “a unique value proposition for data providers” and he’s not wrong about the Irvine, California based technology company—but it doesn’t really look like they’re offering anything more special than proprietary cookies.