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New Super-sized Customer Database for Amazon?

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the watching-the-watchmen dept.

dtjohnson writes "Amazon.com has applied for a patent to create an online customer database which would allegedly contain 'massive amounts of intimate information about its millions of shoppers, including their religion, sexual orientation, ethnicity and income.' From the article: "The database, which would combine information disclosed voluntarily by customers with facts gleaned from public databases, conceivably would give Amazon a larger or more detailed profile of its customers than any other retailer. Does this cross the privacy line or is it just reasonable data gathering to make retail sales more responsive to customer needs?"

4 of 131 comments (clear)

  1. I, for one by kjones692 · · Score: 4, Funny

    ...welcome our new, omniscient, Amazonian overlords.

    Death by snu-snu!

    --

    Love the Third Amendment?
  2. Re:F Amazon! by JazzLad · · Score: 4, Funny

    Yes, stick it to the man. Buy items you have no interest in to mess with their database.

    -
    Don't blame me if your humour is insufficient.

    --
    "If you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear." - Every fascist, ever
  3. Re:to think if they have a leak like AOL did... by radarsat1 · · Score: 1, Funny

    Hm, that wasn't so much a "leak" as it was someone with a hammer and chisel deliberately poking a hole in the bottom of the boat...

  4. Re:Thankfully... by Rob+the+Bold · · Score: 2, Funny
    storing this amount of personal information for a fucking _shopping site_ is illegal in my country.

    I would hope so . . . that's definately the kind of shopping info that I'd want to keep to myself!

    --
    I am not a crackpot.