Slashdot Mirror
Web Firms Choose Profit Over Privacy
An anonymous reader writes "Web Firms Choose Profit Over Privacy details the tactics of retailers and marketers to sell customer data. Examples include promising not to sell consumer data, but then 'renting' the data, and the use of shopping cart software with different privacy policies than the merchant."
The biggest problem with internet privacy issues in the past has been the lack of ability to track sources of information for advertisers - one had no idea whether advertiser XYZ got your address from Amazon.com or Bobscomputers.biz. Although there are several new pay and free e-mail systems now for identifying individual sources, such systems are hardly ubiquitous and none exist as-yet for truly identifying sources of telephone numbers, snail-mail addresses, and other sensitive personal information. For this reason, consumers often find it extremely difficult to police these firms and take their business elsewhere and the first alternative to self- and consumer-policing to come to mind is actual legal enforcement with actual investigative action against firms - something beyond the consumer-helping-consumer nature of the Better Business Bureau. It is here that the complaint about lack of privacy in online transactions, while very valid, is in part hypocritical coming from the Slashdot community, one which - with the interests of protecting the freedom of the internet and keeping any one nation from declaring some kind of jurisdiction over the Internet - is always mixed in its views of governmental 'net policing. Perhaps an easy compromise can be found in this case, or maybe an entirely new approach must be taken altogether...
Piracy over profit!
If it's not already illegal, this should be, especially if there is no notice of any particular size informing the user that the change is present. If a shopping cart is linked from the primary site, such that the users of the primary site must use the shopping cart, the terms of service should propagate with it too. This could set some interesting legal precedents if it's explored.
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
What next?
Businesses choose profit over customer safety?
Businesses choose profit over employee safety?
What about the obvious?
Businesses choose profit over anything else!?!
I am glad the Washington Post is on top of this. I doubt I would have ever figured this out on my own.
ACK
"Recently, for example, the Christopher Reeve Paralysis Foundation advertised that its list of donors, including postal addresses, was for rent"
He gets free fetuses AND the ability to sell people's personal info! Come on!!!!
How to make money with your own domain:
1. create a ton of email addresses
2. sell list of email address to spammers
3. after a week or two, destroy the email addresses
4. go to step 1
I don't know of too many companies that have the following business plan:
...
1. Make product
2.
3. Privacy!
All humor aside, I think it's time we just start over. We need an Internet2 (wait... already taken -- Internet3!) that only allows individuals and well-behaved companies onto it... Either that, or we could just move back to Gopher...
Slashdot's first reaction to VMware
To parents interested in buying the popular Hooked on Phonics learn-to-read programs, the company made a firm promise on its Web site: It would never sell or rent their personal information to other marketers. But that pledge was empty.
The children are Hooked on Phonics, and now the parents are Hooked on Phony Emails.
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
I'll pay $5 for the name of that anonymous submitter.
Why did he say psycho ex-boyfriends and not ex-girlfriends? Is Chris hinting at something here? Or am I drawing conclusions where they don't exist.
An Indian-American Hindu committed to non-violent thought/speech/action alarmed by the global explosion of radical Islam
Let's face it, the Internet is just not private. The Internet was conceived in a semi-private environment, absolutely bereft of retail commercial incentive, when the primary concern was sharing information.
I work in information privacy in health care. We are faced with the competing interests of sharing information and protecting confidences. It is a zero sum game between the two, to get one you have to give on the other.
I shop quite a lot on the Internet, but I do it as a special user on my systems so that my e-mail address, browser caches and cookie stores are distinct from those I use when otherwise communicating with people for non-commercial endeavors. I always lie about my gender, income, region and interests to web forms seeking demographic information. I use a special
credit card for Internet purchases which always go to my work address.
Does this give me absolute privacy? No, but it keeps me from being low-hanging fruit. I realize not everyone has the opportunities I do, but there are some things anyone can do.
We aren't entirely powerless in this game. Like all other technological challenges, you just have to keep ahead and don't let your predilection for convenience and free stuff lead you into stupid disclosures.
The best way to do is to be.
the 257th Rule of Acquisition says "Sell to your customers first, then sell your customers!"
If my email address is that damn valuable, it seems to me that I should be the one making money from it.
Why couldn't I create a licensing program for my personal info to sell licenses to marketers for, say, $10 million US per contact attempt.
It's my f***'n email address, after all, so I should be able to set the price. They should be at least as responsible with my information as other businesses are with their inventory.
"Lawyers are for sucks."
- Doug McKenzie
Isn't that the whole point of capitalism?
0 1 - just my two bits
...to learn that the Hooked on Phonics company was promising not to sell or rent customer's information while advertising it for sale in a trade magazine. Until I read the reason - "A company spokeswoman said the firm was simply slow to update its policy."
That's a big relief, because I was a little slow in updating my checkbook, and now that I think about it, I simply forgot that the account I wrote their check on was closed in 1996.
666-607: 6th floor apartment of the beast
...some people will do it. It's money, and it's more money than a lot of people realize.
For example, I run a site that's pretty damn big, something like 300,000 accounts so far. I've already gotten several "business inquries" from direct marketing companies asking if I'd like to "rent" my customer data to them -- and some of these people are offering upward of 5 cents per user. And I don't have to tell you that a nickel here and a nickel adds up.
I haven't sold my user lists and never will, but rest assured that if I wanted to there is a huge market of companies that would be willing to let me name my own price.
And that is why companies do it.
Hilary Rosen's speech was about her love of money and her desire to roll around naked in a pile of money.
Actually, considering how business works and that they will only do PROFITABLE stuff, the most scary thing would be that spam ACTUALLY WORKS! It's hard to believe, but on this planet there are actually people who are willing to buy $1 viagra-knockoffs, have their mortages refinanced by an obscure company 2000+ miles away, are interested in teenage girls doing various uhm... procreational activities for "free" (amateur porn surfers; real men use http://www.thehun.com/ and http://www.sublimedirectory.com/ anyways) and have 300+ phds, degrees, titles, whatnot which aren't recognized ANYWHERE. The problem isn't the spammers that much, the problem is (as usual) stupid people.
I mean, who the FUCK would believe an email from a no-name company, adressing you by your email adress, containing 200+ typos to evade spam filters, uses all-capital text and can be grossly offensive? (Despite popular opinion, I'm not really interested or charmed by a jpg featuring two (or more) south-american guys in a homoerotic position featuring a nice close up of some anal penetration. Remember I'm talking about guys here.)
Hate me!
While I don't condone what Hooked on Phonics does, I wonder if they do something similar if you call their 1-800 number and you give them your mailing/shipping address. One of the big rationales behind store credit card offers and discount cards is obtaining customer information.
Anyone notice an irksome trend amongst retailers? "Sure, we sold you down the river, but we're not evil, we're just dumber than squirrels. Tough break, but I'm sure none of the five hundred spamhausen we sold your kid's details to will be as unscrupulous or idiotic as us!"
Since when did "We screwed up, but, meh." become an acceptable excuse?
Oh, wait, since Enron and Worldcomm. I forgot. Sorry, my bad. :(
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
Or whatever you call it in this case..
They say everything is private. So you give them the info. Then later, they want to change their policy, so they just notify everyone they are going to give away the info unless they are told not to.
The thing is.. My deal with them is ALREADY DONE, and it was under the agreement that the info not be shared. I should not have to do maintenance to keep it that way.. THEY should have to get my express permission to share that information at a later date.. nut just send me a note and make me, again, state I don't want it released.. because we already agreed to that.
I guess it's not marketing.. but it's like how some cable companies would give everyone the new, upgraded package of shows, then expect anyone who didn't want to pay extra once the trial period was up to notify them, or else get billed. I know in BC the courts ruled it an illegal practice. People already agreed to a package.. you can't start changing it. Of course, the cable company caved anyway before the courts were done when a thousand or so people called in to cancel their cable immediately in protest. That gets their attention.
Changing a policy regarding that information should be clearly illegal.
I wrote this in a fit of pique some years back. I've never tried actually putting into practice, though.
If, using nothing more than a, "license," these companies can absolve themselves of social responsibility with the stroke of a pen -- or the tap of a key -- then surely you can drag them back to civilized behavior using the same methods.
Schwab
Editor, A1-AAA AmeriCaptions
If you're going to include a link in a slashdot story, link to the page with ads. It's not free to put content on the web, and the producers of content deserve compensation.
Linking to a page where the newspaper, who has expended capital to report the story, will get no ad revenue is wrong!
My other sig is extremely clever...
Didn't read the article, did you?
This wasn't an article crying, "Boo hoo, the marketers are selling our information!" It was in article crying, "Boo hoo, the marketers are telling us they won't sell our information, and are lying about it!"
If a merchant says they won't sell any of my personal information, but neglects to say that they consider renting it out to be A-ok, I think there's a problem there.
If a merchant says that they won't disclose any of my personal information, but neglects to say that transactions are handled by another company (even though they all take place on the merchant's site, with a little "Powered By CartManager" logo at the bottom), and that that third party has no trouble selling my personal information, I think there's a problem there.
If a charity says on its web site that it won't disclose any of my personal information, but neglects to say that that just happens to not apply to people who donate through the mail instead of online, I think there's a problem there.
Finally, if a merchant says they won't sell or rent my personal information, and then sells or rents it, I think there's a problem there.
This has nothing to do with marketers collecting information. This has to do with marketers collecting information in methods that range from the dubious to the outright fraudulent.
Seriously, though, I don't think we should have to resign ourselves to the obligatory "guess who's not surprised" comment every time we hear about this. The free market is based upon the theory that people make rational decisions based on a full knowledge of the exchange. When an online company deliberately conceals their ability to profit from my transaction without my knowledge, that's kind of like me giving you $10 for that old coffee table and then taking your daughter's virginity to boot. It's doubtful that the $10 I originally offered would have sufficed as payment for the coffee table and the additional service taken.
The point: I should be informed how my information will profit the company and be given full value for the exchange. If my information can be sold or rented for $10, then I should receive an in-kind discount on the product or service I am getting. Or alternatively, if I find the practice repugnant, I can take my business to someone who offers a comprehensive privacy policy that is worth paying the extra $10 for.
Under capitalism man exploits man. Under communism it's the other way around.