Netflix Sued For Privacy Invasion

We've discussed the Netflix Prize numerous times as the contest ran, including the news two years ago that the anonymity of the dataset had been broken. Now reader azoblue sends in this excerpt from Wired: "An in-the-closet lesbian mother is suing Netflix for privacy invasion, alleging the movie rental company made it possible for her to be outed when it disclosed insufficiently anonymous information about nearly half-a-million customers as part of its $1 million contest to improve its recommendation system. ... The lead attorney on the new suit, Joseph Malley, recently reached a multimillion-dollar settlement with Facebook over its failed Beacon program, which drew fire in part for sharing users’ Blockbuster rentals with their friends. ... If a data set reveals a person's ZIP code, birthdate and gender, there's an 87 percent chance that the person can be uniquely identified." The suit turns on the question of whether Netflix should have known that their dataset's anonymity could be broken, two years before researchers demonstrated that.

Comments

Yes

[RichardJenkins]

How large an area is a zip code in the states? I think in the UK if a company publicly released sensitive data about a people with their birthday and postcode attached there'd be outrage. Muppets.

Re:Yes

[akcpe]

It varies in size. I've lived in zip codes where population has ranged from maybe 20,000 people to one as large as 300,000 people.

Re:Yes

[Shakrai]

How large an area is a zip code in the states?

Depends on how many households and businesses there are in the area. In a rural setting a zip code may cover an entire city or county. In a heavily urbanized area it may only cover a single building or city block.

The five digit zip code doesn't tell the whole story though. There's actually the nine digit zip code plus a two digit delivery point code. Every single address in the United States will have a unique nine digit zip code + delivery code. It doesn't mean much to the layman but the USPS can actually represent every single address in the United States with an 11 digit number.

Re:Yes

[Diss Champ]

It depends on whether it is the long zip or the short zip. The short zip is 5 digits, and that's what most people use when sending personal letters and such; the shorter zip adds additional digits and narrows things considerably.

Some quick back of the envelope says that 5 digits has 100,000 combinations, meaning that you only have thousands of people (~3k) per zip (some zips more, some less, they assigned them before some population movement). With 366 possible birth days across a number of years (I'm assuming year is specified), even the 5 digit narrows things down uniquely for lots of people.

If they released the long zip, which they compute to speed their mailing based on your address, then it gets real easy to narrow things. The extra zip has another 4 digits!

Re:Yes

[oldspewey]

300000 people in a single ZIP code? In Canada, a unique Postal Code covers maybe 50-80 houses along a street or two, or at most one large condo building with 2000 residents or so.

Within a pool of 2000 (or fewer) people, I can see how gender and DOB could provide unique identification with 87% accuracy. Within a pool of 300000? Not so much.

Re:Yes

[mcgrew]

Springfield, Il (Where Alderman Simpson lives) has a population of 110,000 and roughly five zip codes.

Re:Yes

[E IS mC(Square)]

There is a difference between US zip code system and Canadian one.

In the US, there is zip5 + zip4 (total 9 digits). If you use both, you are talking about 2-3 houses on a street. This is equivalent to Canadian 3+3 system. But a five digit US zip code may mean anything from one business building to very large number depending on the density.

Re:Yes

[akcpe]

There's really two different ways of listing the code actually, one of which would probably get you down to that level. Zip code is 5 digits + 4 additional digits. When mailing something only the first 5 are required. the additional 4 would likely identify you down to the street level. 12345-XXXX would get you there, but there may be a hundred thousand people in all of 12345. Its unclear to me which Netflix released. Generally the mail I receive with an automatically generated address label (such as from Netflix) includes the -XXXX

Re:Yes

[MBGMorden]

Generally the mail I receive with an automatically generated address label (such as from Netflix) includes the -XXXX

Just a note, but the reasoning for that is that bulk mailings have a series of steps they can perform to get postage discounts. CASS certification of the address is one of those. It requires lots of things be done to addresses - St. in a city name for example must be spelled out as "Saint" since St is used as the abbreviation for "street". you also have to consistently abbreviate the street names. You can't write out "Street" in the street name unless it's part of the actual name (ie, "Market Street Rd" would be fine, but not "Market Street"). Among the restrictions though is also a requirement that you use the full Zip+4 zip code.

I can't remember the exact discount but IIRC it's around $0.08 per letter. Not a lot, but where I'm at for example we do several large mailings per year that end up between 70,000 and 90,000 letters in volume. With postage bills for those things being tens of thousands for dollars, that $0.08 per letter adds up fast.

Re:Yes

[Anonymous Coward]

The UK comes under the European Data Protection Act. Any company releasing any personal data will be in deep shit if caught. The rules have also been tightened since the early version in 1984. If there's a remote chance someone receiving the data can piece bits together, expect a massive fine. Bizarrely, you can buy PAF and telephone directories on CDs though!

Re:Yes

[E IS mC(Square)]

>> Its unclear to me which Netflix released.

At the most, the zip5 (and not full).

The address you see on the envelop can be (slightly) different than the one stored as part of your profile, because, most likely, as part of their mass-mailing program, they would do address standardization/correction and generate a more accurate address.

Re:Yes

[TheSeventh]

Was it necessary to release the birth date of the users? As if the day of the month you were born in would matter in which movies you liked? No more than month and year should have been included, probably no more than the year.

The problem is most people don't think, and those that do, don't think about what they're doing from a security standpoint. "Will this work?" or "Will this be safe?" is vastly different from "Can this be abused?" or even "Is all of this really necessary?"

Re:Yes

[AusIV]

In some less dense areas the +4 will be specific to a house. I can't imagine netflix would have released that and claimed their data was anonymous.

Re:Yes

[Drummergeek0]

RTFA, Netflix has not released any zip code data, that was for their second contest which has not yet launched. The first only released movie history and a unique ID to the user(not the username)

Re:Yes

[AnotherUsername]

My zip code has around 4,000 people in it. This includes a town, several townships, and the countryside in a 10 mile diameter circle around the town. A person wouldn't have to do much digging to find out who so and so is based on a zip code and a birthday.

Re:Yes

[Anonymous Coward]

Its unclear to me which Netflix released.

Well, then, just assume the worst and call for the death penalty against Netflix's employees, their families, and their friends. This IS Slashdot, after all.

Re:Yes

[Faux_Pseudo]

This way the practitioners of astrology could finally offer up proof that the planets have an influence on our lives. Then they could have gotten not just the Netflix money but the JREF money too.

Or maybe they were just not thinking? Naa.

Re:Yes

[kent_eh]

300000 people in a single ZIP code? In Canada, a unique Postal Code covers maybe 50-80 houses along a street or two, or at most one large condo building with 2000 residents or so.

Or an entire small town, and all the farms surrounding it.

For instance, Minnedosa, Manitoba has one postal code, which is for the post office building and all the mail boxes located there. The town and surrounding farms are all postal code R0J 1E0. Current population is a bit over 2500, probably closer to 3500 mailboxes when you count in businesses and farmers.

But in the cities, you are right. One postal code can be as few as one side of a street for one block.

Re:Yes

[dem0n1]

12345 is General Electric's zip code in NY.

Re:Yes

[coolsnowmen]

That isn't really true in my area so I wanted to call bullshit. Then I realized that in most rural places that is probably true.

population in the USA ~300,000,000
zip 5+4= 1 to 999,999,999.
I know it isn't direct, but that means you could basically have a postal code for ever house in the country and for every business, and one left over for ever PO box

Re:Yes

[grimw]

Sweet, someone referenced my home town! And yes, the Simpsons are from there. P.S. Don't go to the neighborhood where the Simpsons live (Evergreen Terrace) if you want to live very long. P.P.S. It says they liev in Evergreen Terrace at the beginning of the show when they pan out of the their neighborhood, away from the sign.

Re:Yes

[grocer]

I think month would be valid...for instance, I have a January birthday so my culture experience is going to be different than somebody with a birthday later in the year simply because I would be a year ahead of them in school and presumably the things that shaped my likes and dislikes are going to be different than somebody who was born in, say, September as I would consistently have been a year ahead of them in school...as this trend continues through the primary and secondary school years, I could see how this data point could be quite relevant.

Re:Yes

[E IS mC(Square)]

Hey, I was not pulling that out of my ass. I work on similar system right now and know something about zip codes :-)

Now about your theory, here is a better explanation (from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ZIP_code#ZIP_.2B_4)

"A ZIP + 4 code uses the basic five-digit code plus four additional digits to identify a geographic segment within the five-digit delivery area, such as a city block, a group of apartments, an individual high-volume receiver of mail or any other unit that could use an extra identifier to aid in efficient mail sorting and delivery." (the keyword is "within")

Re:Yes

[j_166]

12345? That's the stupidest zip code I've ever heard in my life. That's the kind of code an idiot would have on their luggage.

Re:Yes

[Gnavpot]

It doesn't mean much to the layman but the USPS can actually represent every single address in the United States with an 11 digit number.

...compared to the UK where every single address can be represented with 6-8 lines of gibberish...

Re:Yes

[mcgrew]

I live here. Hell, afaik you could be in one of my journals. Ever drink at Felber's? It's in the ghetto at 15th and Cornell. Amazingly, it's a redneck bar.

Where were you when the tornados tore though in '06?

Re:Yes

[Anonymous Coward]

actually there is an 11 digit delivery code that uniqueyl identifies a single place

Re:Yes

[gruber_aekdb]

I would assume a likely reason the month, day and year was given out would be the way the database was set up. It is likely their customer database is set up so that it saves the data mmddyyyy, so if I queried the record for the US, I'd get 07041776 (or something to that effect anyway). Whoever ran the query to generate the data set possibly did not have the required privileges or know-how to manipulate the data to exclude the dd /or the mmdd part of the field.

Or maybe the Netflix peon who generated the data set didn't know it was going to be given to outside parties. He got in Monday morning, found an email from his boss "I need you to generate a data file for me with this information, I need it by Wed afternoon". generates the list, assuming his boss was going to keep it in house (and since anyone in house already has access to the customer's full record - there's no need to mask the birth date).

Besides, just because we can't think of a reason having the full birth date would be helpful doesn't mean one doesn't exist. TheSeventh argued that the month & day wouldn't be needed. grocer, on the other hand, brings up a good reason why at least month could be helpful. I'm sure with some thought we might come up with a rational for the date too. But without having access to the data & running tests on it we couldn't say. Maybe there's a trend that if you were born on an even date you're more likely to like comedy over slasher flicks. That could be useful in predicting the types of movies people like...

Re:Yes

[tenton]

I'd better go change the code on my luggage.

Re:Yes

[joocemann]

How large an area is a zip code in the states? I think in the UK if a company publicly released sensitive data about a people with their birthday and postcode attached there'd be outrage. Muppets.

Exactly. How about my information between me and the company just stays that way? How about I get a little respect from the people who I pay money to?

I would *always* rather pay more for something, knowing that the seller will respect me (honor warranty, replace item, PROTECT MY DATA, etc).

Why play stupid stunts to generate stimulation and end up screwing people when you could just run an honest business?

Let me guess... the american expectation of cheapness drives it.... We want EVERYTHING, and we want it for a dollar. Why are cellphones tied to plans? We want the unit to be cheap. Why is everything manufactured half-assed and unreliable? We need it made in china to meet our price points. Why are our foods full of GMO, hormones, antiboitics, and preservatives? We want more food and we want it cheap, that way we can afford a cell phone and a bunch of plastic toys....

So there is a 2 part disease here. Cheapness-fueled mega consumerisim, and corporate/business greed. We don't need so much crap, and businesses don't need to keep pushing for MORE profits.

Its our own fault. We just won't admit it because its too hard to look in the mirror and say "I buy tons of crap with my money and I don't really know why."

Re:Yes

[Rich0]

Yup. I know somebody who was involved in some software that dealt with clinical trial data and they were ultra-paranoid about this sort of stuff (to the point where access to many fields in the database was need-to-know). A full date of birth was considered as sensitive as a name/address or ID code (and they didn't even track SSNs). Even the age or year-of-birth was considered sensitive if the age was above a threshold (how many 97-year-olds are there?).

They clearly didn't talk to a lawyer versed in this stuff before releasing this data.

Re:Yes

[742Evergreen]

I resent that slanderous accusation.

Re:Yes

[Jah-Wren Ryel]

I think month would be valid...for instance, I have a January birthday so my culture experience is going to be different than somebody with a birthday later in the year simply because I would be a year ahead of them in school...

Not consistently. Every state has different rules for what year you enter school, some states even let the local school districts decide. I have three cousins, all older than me by up to about 6 months but due to the fact that we lived in different states 2 of them were one grade behind me and one was one grade ahead of me.

Re:Yes

[Anonymous Coward]

Doesn't the UK have the greatest number of public surveillance cameras monitoring everyone like Big Brother? Where's the outrage there?

Re:Yes

[coolsnowmen]

does it have a name?

Re:Yes

[grimw]

I was in Edwardsville, IL during the '06 tornado. I was in my ex-girlfriend's apartment at that time.

Never been to or heard of Felber's. I do love The Magic Kitchen though. I haven't been able to find any place quite like it, even here in NY.

Re:Yes

[mcgrew]

I went to college in Edwardsville in the late seventies. As to the tornado, the local paper has a retrospective about it with a pretty good picture of its devastation.

Felber's is a little redneck bar in the ghetto, on 15th street.

netflix tracks birthdates?

[Shakrai]

I don't recall handing over my birthdate when I signed up for my account. I just went through all of the account screens and couldn't find it either. What part of their service expects you to tell them your birthday?

Re:netflix tracks birthdates?

[fwice]

I just signed up for an account. It asked for your birthday on the page with your address. However, it _was not_ mandatory.

I conveniently skipped the 'birthdate', 'gender', and 'your opinion of these genre' sections.

Re:netflix tracks birthdates?

[bmearns]

I'm guessing they probably ask if you're renting adult material. If the mother was outed by the movies she rented, she was probably renting adult material.

Re:netflix tracks birthdates?

[Shakrai]

Netflix has adult material on it? Why wasn't I aware of this awesome featur^W^Wmoral outrage? ;)

Re:netflix tracks birthdates?

[Neon Spiral Injector]

Netflix has no "adult" material. Sure, a few NC-17 films (many of them for violence as much as sex), and some unrated titles, which may get a little blue. But nothing like the backroom of local rental stores.

They don't require an age to be specified because they assume if you have a credit card (which is required) then you can rent anything they have.

Re:netflix tracks birthdates?

[hrieke]

But, now depending on your movie selections a good system will be able to defer those bits of information.
Data leakage happens; just computers made it easier to do the grunt work.

Re:netflix tracks birthdates?

[bmearns]

Huh, I had no idea, thanks for pointing that out. In that case, I don't get what she was renting that would out her. Ani Difranco videos?

Re:netflix tracks birthdates?

[bmearns]

Nope, sorry. I sit corrected. Neon Spiral Injector (#21234) pointed out that they do not.

Re:netflix tracks birthdates?

[Anonymous Coward]

But, now depending on your movie selections a good system will be able to infer those bits of information.
Data leakage happens; just computers made it easier to do the grunt work.

fixed that for you.

and the system, no matter how good, will not be able to infer OP's opinion of these genres.

it may, however, be able to infer that the user[s] of the account have a desire to have certain discs mailed to them.

Maybe the OP is a student in a course on film, required to see a certain set of movies. OP's _opinion_ of them could be that they are complete crap, but requests them to pass the course. :]

Re:netflix tracks birthdates?

[Neon Spiral Injector]

They do have a "Gay & Lesbian" genre, which includes such films as (from the first page):

Milk
The L Word
Angels in America
Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil
Fried Green Tomatoes

Re:netflix tracks birthdates?

[bmearns]

Man, I am battin' a thousand. I'm gonna go ahead and stop talking on this thread now. =J

Re:netflix tracks birthdates?

[Verdatum]

And the crux of the lawsuit is the presumption that straight people are not allowed to like these movies...wait...I liked Milk quite a bit, and Angels in America was one of the most incredible things I've ever seen. Damnit, my girlfriend is gonna kill me when I tell her I found out I was gay...via Slashdot no less.

Re:netflix tracks birthdates?

[BOFslime]

I double checked my account profile and the only thing it has is birth year, which is used for age group movie recommendations. There is also a pull down menu for the account owner and any sub users on the account as to what movies they are allowed to rent/watch (instantly) Highest is R but there is also 'unrated family'. No where did I enter my full birth date, only year and gender. But this also looks partly removable (or you could lie), but I don't have anything to hide so I don't care and I will enjoy proper recommendations.

Re:netflix tracks birthdates?

[hrieke]

Thanks for the correction.

On your line to a for film school- NF would notice a group in a zip code or a short distance from one another all selecting the same films- adding external data sources to this should be able to determine if someone is in school and if so what classes they are taking (see the ability to tie movie reviews to facebook data sets).
Further, the longer someone rents from NF the larger the dataset is, so a more complete idea of what the person likes and dislikes should pop out, and something like a film school course rentals would become noise.

Actually, from a movie studio's point of view, I'd want to data mine the NF data set to see what types of movies actually do well, cross broad demographics, and so on, and then make the crappy movies based on that criteria.
I'm sure the investors would demand that.

Re:netflix tracks birthdates?

[Sloppy]

I haven't seen any of those movies, but damn did I laugh hard in Victor/Victoria so I guess that means I'm gay, or at least a cross-dresser.

I also liked Robocop, so I'm outed as a cyborg (goes well with my transvestism). And since I'm a Star Trek fan too, now everyone knows where I got my cyborg technology, and they know the perverted details of my transvestism, which is that it's not so much about putting on dresses, as it means that I use a lot of green body paint. Nothing turns me on so much as "going over to the green side" (yes, I've rented Leprechaun 3 also) and seeing what it does to my gay cyborg lovers.

Re:netflix tracks birthdates?

[langarto]

Why not?

Re:netflix tracks birthdates?

[flabordec]

Don't worry! You're not gay. My system says you are a lesbian mom!

Re:netflix tracks birthdates?

[Anonymous Coward]

Even if a rental list was somehow connected to her, I'm sure there were many other factors that would have "outed" her. It's not hard for a neighbour to witness activity around her house or seeing her at the store, co-workers suspicious blah blah blah.
All that aside.. My opinion, if you are gay, why are you hiding it? If you are afraid of being treated differently at work or being discriminated against in your neighbourhood, handle that DISCRIMINATION problem when and if it happens. The discrimination is the problem, not the fact that people now know your sexual orientation. If you are worried about how people would feel about it or what people will be saying about it at the water cooler, well, tough crap. People are different and they all have opinions. Welcome to the real world, THERE IS NOTHING YOU CAN DO ABOUT THAT EVER, any one that is different in any way shape or form will have more comments said about them behind the scenes. It is not a crime for people to have their own opinions and to not like a certain thing(s). It is a crime to discriminate in the work place and most places in society so deal with that when it happens. I work at a company with about 5000 employees and our personnel director is openly gay. He worked his way up through the company and he is respected as much as any personnel administrator should expect. Does he care that people might be talking about him behind his back? Based on my talking with him, he doesn't care a single bit.

Re:netflix tracks birthdates?

[mrisaacs]

Actually the film student model would not necessarily create a cluster.
The student might be taking a class via a distance, on-line or weekend program, and the school may not be local. The other students could be scattered over a large area, even distributed across the country.

Re:netflix tracks birthdates?

[T Murphy]

If the birthdate is just for adult material, they may as well just ask for the month and year- or only let the month and year be used in algorithms.

Re:netflix tracks birthdates?

[Zequel]

Hah, oh no - Netflix has a lot of adult movies, just gotta know where to look - try steamy romance for one. Once you find one, you can look link to the others with related movies. Try "Emannuelle" for one.

Re:netflix tracks birthdates?

[Anonymous Coward]

If the mother was outed by the movies she rented, she was probably renting adult material.

Quite a leap of assumption there!

1. Of the gay women I've known who actively enjoy porn, there's a bias towards straight porn, and even sometimes gay (men) porn, not surprising given how crap and cliched and made-for-men most "lesbian" porn actually is. (One thing I've learnt over the last few years is - beware of making assumptions on the subject of sexuality... It really is a subject that's as deep and wide as the ocean. :)

2. If I knew a woman had just watched Monster, If These Walls Could Talk 2, Boys Don't Cry, Prey for Rock n Roll, or any of a whole host of other lgbt-women-oriented non-porn films, and so had many of her friends, then my gaydar would be bleeping like crazy (again assumptions can be dangerous, but if her friends had a similar film bias I'd give it a good 90%.)

Although I don't (well until I started to read some of the comments on slashdot, I didn't) think most of the intelligent world is quite so bothered about peoples' sexualities, things were very different 10 or 20 years ago, and it's easy to get real paranoid and lose track of reality as it usually is now (there's sadly still enough homophobia out there capable of hurting folk who're already struggling to learn to love and accept themselves.)

And yes, it can take some (many) folk time to really get to grips with their sexuality. It's not uncommon for a woman to have relationships with men and even children before discovering their sexuality. Plus sexuality can sometimes move around. I had no idea that I'd enjoy sex with women until my first experiences, even then it took time, now I'm addicted and there's no going back!

Sexuality is complicated! :)

Re:netflix tracks birthdates?

[hrieke]

Strong correlation between the time window and sequence of films in the queue would ID the students.

Re:netflix tracks birthdates?

[Anonymous Coward]

Despite having seen and liked 3 of those 5, I am not a lesbian.

Re:netflix tracks birthdates?

[demonlapin]

Be careful what you tell Netflix. When I joined it asked me to rate movies. I went through, rated a few things that showed up. I got some critically acclaimed stuff at first, rated that pretty well, and then I made a crucial mistake. I told it that I loved Strictly Ballroom. Well, apparently that is the gayest movie in existence. Especially if you already like critically-acclaimed films.

Next thing I knew, it was suggesting Philadelphia, The L Word, that (Showtime?) show about gay people, Priscilla Queen of the Desert... it took me a good 20 minutes up-rating stuff like Saw, Seven, Taxi Driver, Pulp Fiction, and Heavy Metal to get it to quit.

Re:netflix tracks birthdates?

[Mister Whirly]

You are talking about a pretty specific instance here. I mean how many Netflix customers do you think are film students taking film classes, but not locally?

Re:netflix tracks birthdates?

[mrisaacs]

Quite possible, assuming the film is:

1. Not a cult classic
2. Not overly popular
3. Not a new release.
4. Popular in only certain regions.
5. Not recently nominated for an award.
6. Not starring or featuring someone recently in the news, newly popular or deceased.

If any of the above are true, the sample for a given timeframe could be skewed and the student data would not be significantly large enough to be seen.
If there was particular demographic information available that would allow the "regular" population to be filtered out - you might be able to spot the students - which might itself be useless if a significant number of the students use a parent's or partner's credit card. .

Re:netflix tracks birthdates?

[31415926535897]

I think she already knows her girlfriend is gay.

Re:netflix tracks birthdates?

[Belial6]

That depends on what you consider adult content. While Netflix claims that Alice In Wonderland: An Adult Musical is rated R, the movie it self has an X rating notice at the beginning. And, while they did cut out the actual close ups of insertion, Pirates was filmed as a full on porno.

So, while they many not have much, and it may not be hard core by today's standards, they do have adult content.

Re:netflix tracks birthdates?

[aztracker1]

roflmfao... That's awesome... I usually hit the comedies, and action films first, then other stuff...

Re:netflix tracks birthdates?

[MikeBabcock]

I lie about my birthday on almost all websites. I consider it part of my password -- there's no need for them to have a valid birth date unless they're a credit validation company or my bank, and giving it out just leaves way too much information open for cross-referencing.

Re:netflix tracks birthdates?

[MikeBabcock]

You mean straights don't like lesbian content now? When did this happen?

Re:netflix tracks birthdates?

[Bill_the_Engineer]

Fried Green Tomatoes?

Re:netflix tracks birthdates?

[WillDraven]

Yeah I seem to have missed the lesbian sex scene in that one...

Re:netflix tracks birthdates?

[Anonymous Coward]

Netflix has adult material on it?

As other users have pointed out, they don't really have porn on Netflix, but they do have some 'borderline' movies. However, they used to have quite an extensive full on porn collection like 7 or 8 years ago. I remember it fondly (hence the anonymous post). I'm guessing they phased that out when they decided to start sharing your movie history with friends.

Re:netflix tracks birthdates?

[Anonymous Coward]

As other users have pointed out, they don't really have porn on Netflix, but they do have some 'borderline' movies. However, they used to have quite an extensive full on porn collection like 7 or 8 years ago. I remember it fondly (hence the anonymous post). I'm guessing they phased that out when they decided to start sharing your movie history with friends.

Evidence: http://www.netflix.com/Movie/Key_to_Sex/22469112

Re:netflix tracks birthdates?

[demonlapin]

And now get things like "This movie suggested based on your interest in: A Clockwork Orange and Silence of the Lambs" or "... interest in Secretary, Californication, and Hostel".

I'm pigeonholed, yes my horrorshow droogies, but it's a bolshoi pigeonhole it is.

Birthdate?

[chill]

The entire birthday? Holy crap! What did they expect?! Even just narrowing it down to birth year gives you a way to narrow the set considerably when combined with the other two items. What was wrong with the traditional "18-24, 25-40, etc." age ranges?

Re:Birthdate?

[Anonymous Coward]

What was wrong with the traditional "18-24, 25-40, etc." age ranges?

Getting rid of poorly fitting ranges was the point of the Netflix challenge...

So lemme get this straight...

[Carik]

... this woman is a closeted lesbian. She came to the realization that, if someone hypothetical person were to come along and get into the NetFlix user data system, he could find out she's a lesbian. In order to protect herself from being potentially exposed, she decided to join a high-profile national lawsuit, charging that they had created a potential for people to find out her sexual preferences. How many days do you think it'll be before her picture is all over the web, sitting right next to the headline "formerly closeted lesbian pulled out of closet by attaching her name and face to a privacy lawsuit"?

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[Registered Coward v2]

In order to protect herself from being potentially exposed, she decided to join a high-profile national lawsuit, charging that they had created a potential for people to find out her sexual preferences. How many days do you think it'll be before her picture is all over the web, sitting right next to the headline "formerly closeted lesbian pulled out of closet by attaching her name and face to a privacy lawsuit"?

She filed as a Jane Doe to protect her privacy.

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[Shakrai]

More to the point, what data does Netflix have on you that reveals you to be a closed lesbian? I don't recall seeing a "Are you a closet homosexual?" button when I signed up for my account.

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[hansamurai]

IANAL, but she's filed the suit as Jane Doe. Whether this actually protects her or not someone who is a lawyer may be able to chime in.

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[Carik]

Right. And of course the real names of people who file anonymously NEVER get out.

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[oldspewey]

Ain't America grand?

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[Registered Coward v2]

Right. And of course the real names of people who file anonymously NEVER get out.

To me that's a separate issue - anyone filling a Jane/John Doe lawsuit has to expect their name would eventually become public information.

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[Anonymous Coward]

Netflix shows what you watch to others that are your "Netflix friends". It's a minor social network that allows you to pass recommendations to others. If they're really snoopy they can see what you watch...but there's also an option to cut that off that's about five clicks deep in the settings.

So, if all you do is rent skinimax flicks. Yeah, I could see feeling exposed...but honestly, I don't think it's a big deal.

If privacy is such a big deal to people, they need to get informed. End of story. You can't half-ass privacy. Either bury your identity or deal with the fact that if you put it out there...it's out there.

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[bmearns]

I think the outter was the particular list of movies she was renting...

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[patrickthbold]

Maybe she's "taking one for the team." Seriously, I really don't want these companies that have a lot of our private data to have the attitude that, "It doesn't matter if this gets out because if anyonesays anything then they will just draw more attention to themselves."

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[multisync]

In order to protect herself from being potentially exposed, she decided to join a high-profile national lawsuit ... How many days do you think it'll be before her picture is all over the web

From TFA:

That's why the lesbian mom joined the lawsuit as a Jane Doe, according to the complaint

But bonus points for "lemme get this straight"

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[bmearns]

There's a term for that: https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/The_Streisand_effect

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[corbettw]

It's all the Rosie O'Donnell and Margaret Cho comedy specials in her queue.

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[Anonymous Coward]

...you put the lime in the coconut.

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[nomadic]

Yes, it does.

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[Aeros]

It would be great if her real name really was Jane Doe eh?

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[zippthorne]

The woman bore a child as part of her cover. Not saying that means there aren't damages, but clearly there are some issues there with good decision making.

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[Carik]

anyone filling a Jane/John Doe lawsuit has to expect their name would eventually become public information.

Exactly. So she's just come out on her own... in order to sue someone for the potential that someone going through their data MIGHT be able to figure out that she's a lesbian.

My point is still the same... she's given up on her privacy in order to sue someone for a potential (but not yet real) breach of privacy.

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[Anonymous Coward]

God, I hope not. Otherwise I am in a lot of trouble.

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[ViViDboarder]

That's Parent's point... She should expect that this info would get out... She's MORE likely to be outed by pursuing this suit than just letting things be.

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[Xtravar]

And if she wins, how exactly does she explain the influx of money to her family?

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[Anonymous Coward]

anyone filling a Jane/John Doe lawsuit has to expect their name would eventually become public information.

Exactly. So she's just come out on her own... in order to sue someone for the potential that someone going through their data MIGHT be able to figure out that she's a lesbian.

My point is still the same... she's given up on her privacy in order to sue someone for a potential (but not yet real) breach of privacy.

No, she sued for money

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[nomadic]

To me that's a separate issue - anyone filling a Jane/John Doe lawsuit has to expect their name would eventually become public information.

I don't know if that's true, there are plenty of lawsuits where anonymity is maintained. I'd guess most of them.

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[nomadic]

She's asking for injunctive relief. None of the plaintiffs will get money if they win.

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[nomadic]

I don't recall seeing a "Are you a closet homosexual?" button when I signed up for my account.

You wouldn't, it was a radio button.

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[Anonymous Coward]

She has, apparently. The world's a strange place, buddy, I suggest you start getting used to it.

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[Anonymous Coward]

More to the point, what data does Netflix have on you that reveals you to be a closed lesbian? I don't recall seeing a "Are you a closet homosexual?" button when I signed up for my account.

More to the point, is she a hot lesbian?

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[Verdatum]

Because first you get the money, then you get the power, then you get the women. That's one clever lesbian!

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[Rogerborg]

I bet if she got more injunctive relief, she wouldn't be a lesbian.

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[Beezlebub33]

Probably. But her reasoning for doing so is not entirely clear. Possibilities include:
o Money
o Honest outrage
o Conscious or subconscious desire to out herself
o Honest desire to prevent the outing of other people

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[rhsanborn]

While she may be suing for money, it's not unreasonable that she is willing to accept some backlash and her outing for the sake of justice. Companies would be able to get away with gross privacy breaches if there weren't people to keep them in check like this.

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[Bakkster]

My point is still the same... she's given up on her privacy in order to sue someone for a potential (but not yet real) breach of privacy.

It's a catch-22, no doubt, but at least this way she can possibly force Netflix to fix the initial problem.

She chose to be proactive, rather than sit and worry. Can't fault her for that. Besides, it is hardly a forgone conclusion that she will be revealed as the Jane Doe in a reasonable time frame.

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[Carik]

But if I get used to it, it will stop being so funny!

Honestly, I find the whole concept amusing. "You made it theoretically possible for some small number of people I don't know and will probably never meet to find out something about me I'd rather keep private. Therefore, I will do something much more likely to make that public among LOTS of people! THAT will show you!"

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[Carik]

True. And it's hardly a forgone conclusion that anyone she would ever meet would be involved in analyzing the data from NetFlix. Yes, there's an 87% success rate (according to the article), but how many people are actually doing that analysis? And how likely is it that they would publish the results in her town? Or than anyone in her town would READ the results if they were there?

Drawing attention to herself just ensures that anyone who does look will try to figure out who she is.

If she's consciously made that decision, fine -- more power to her! But I still find the concept entertaining, and a little bit puzzling.

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[TheSeventh]

However, this is a good response to Google's stance on privacy issues that "if you're doing something on the internet you don't want anyone to know about, maybe you shouldn't be doing it."

I don't see how renting whatever mainstream movies she wanted and wanting to keep her orientation a private matter equates to "something she shouldn't be doing."

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[Hijacked Public]

Above is the most brilliant thing ever posted to Slashdot.

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[Bakkster]

Isn't the point of privacy protections to prevent these unlikely circumstances from ever needing to be considered? Add the fact that the dataset is publicly available and it's even more severe. It's a breach of privacy, regardless of whether it is exploited or not.

Besides, I'm sure there are trolls out there who would get their jollies purely by skimming the dataset to find people with embarrasing movie habits purely to expose them. Why wait until that happens when you can file as a Jane Doe to prevent it in the first place?

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[Yo Grark]

You're right, that was TIVO:

http://snarkiness.typepad.com/snarkattack/2002/11/my_tivo_thinks_.html

Yo Grark

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, there's an 87% success rate (according to the article), but how many people are actually doing that analysis? And how likely is it that they would publish the results in her town?

Republicans, who all want to harass and kill homosexuals.

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[Anonymous Coward]

The woman bore a child as part of her cover.

She would hardly be the first woman to put up with a man doing something to her body she didn't particularly enjoy.

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[kent_eh]

Or she figured that she's already been outed, so she might as well do something so it soesen't happen to someone else in the future.

And , of course, there's the money.

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[The Wild Norseman]

Exactly. So she's just come out on her own... in order to sue someone for the potential that someone going through their data MIGHT be able to figure out that she's a lesbian. My point is still the same... she's given up on her privacy in order to sue someone for a potential (but not yet real) breach of privacy.

So is her name Barbara Streisand?

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[crashumbc]

Only the ones that aren't new worthy...

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[crashumbc]

Privacy settings should also be defaulted to the most secure settings...

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[Anonymous Coward]

That's her backup plan. She sues the lawyer for outing her!

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[ColdWetDog]

But bonus points for "lemme get this straight"

Odd choice of words there, multisynch

Straight. Heh.

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[psithurism]

Please ignore parent. His easy, obvious solutions kinda kill the debate.

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[bluefoxlucid]

Except this is an idiotic lawsuit. Her name and her username aren't connected to the data set, just a uniquifying user ID. Someone would have to do some serious data mining to figure out who she is.

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[multisync]

Odd choice of words there, multisynch

Straight. Heh.

It was Carik (205890)'s word choice, not mine. But yep, that was the joke.

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[Anonymous Coward]

Right. And of course the real names of people who file anonymously NEVER get out.

In this case, they are kept in a closet.

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[Anonymous Coward]

To me, being proactive would have been getting her head together and coming out of the closet. This seems more reactionary (and possibly opportunistic) to me. I assume that she asked Netflix to "sanitize" her account information and Netflix refused.

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[Anonymous Coward]

I ordered a movie from netflix based on an HP Lovecraft story. The movie studio that made the movie turned out to be a producer of films with gay and lesbian themes and actors. They changed the main character to a gay man, and there was a gay love scene.

Not my thing anymore than watching straight sex would be to my gay friends, and no big deal.

But Netflix began "suggesting" dozens of gay themed movies to me after that. Took a little work to get that "straightened" out.

I don't care, but some insurance company or future right wing government might, if they were to get the data from Netflix.

Think it won't happen? Look up what IBM did for the German's during WW2. History always repeats itself.

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[nomadic]

Jane Roe of Roe v. Wade fame maintained her anonymity for years, and only became publicly known because she revealed herself.

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[poopdeville]

Yes, there's an 87% success rate (according to the article), but how many people are actually doing that analysis?

Just about anybody involved in the Netflix challenge... that's the whole point. A competition for effective data mining methods.

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[Spasmodeus]

All that tells me is that she doesn't like to laugh.

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[gruber_aekdb]

I don't think, at least in this particular case, the Netflix Friends function is what is at question. You are correct, the Friends option does allow you to view your friends queue, as well as some other recent events (ratings, reviews, etc). I've been a Netflix member for 5 years now, and am acquaintances, friends, and Brothers with numerous individuals with Netflix accounts. In all that time, I've only been Netflix friends with one person (one of my Littles) - and only because we would often swap discs & we used this to keep duplicate rentals down. All she'd have to do to protect her secret is just "forget" to accept the friend request, or just turn it down.

I'm not 100% what information Netflix released, but the it would be the rental history and/or the ratings you assign various movies. She is concerned that knowing what movies she has rented, and/or the ratings she's given movies, the researchers may discover that she has a higher probability of not being heterosexual. Then, combining it with other information that Netflix may have released (birthday, zip code, etc) be able to track her down & knock on her door, or worse... Of course, if someone did question her rental activities, all she'd really have to do is say the only reason she rented those movies was because a friend of hers wanted to see them... I've legitimately rented titles I had little interest in seeing, because I had friends over & they really wanted to see it. She wouldn't have to rate them... And I'd even advise against it if you're trying to keep it a secret... If you rate them, Netfix may put on your home screen "Because you liked 'I'm a closeted Lesbian, please help', you may like ...." And while this may help find more interesting movies, anyone who happens to be shoulder surfing (like one of her kids who happen to walk into the room) may see the title... Of course, a family member could walk into the living room while she's watching her "If-I-like-this-I'm-Lesbian" film, and figure out that mom isn't really renting Girls-Gone-Wild for daddy...

But I think she's really making a mountain out of a mole hill here... Unless of course someone has a reason to target her specifically, I doubt someone is going to take the time to compare movies, figure out who is & who isn't straight, then try to match them with a large list of birth dates, genders and names from an entire zip code... More likely than not, going national like this, will get her outted, and on a bigger scale than had she kept quiet.

Though, I do agree that some kind of attention should be placed on this. While movie rentals may not seem like a big deal, if someone doesn't say "hey, this information really isn't as anonymous as you think it is, next time, it could be something that people are a little more concerned with, like medical records, or tax information...

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[Anonymous Coward]

That's stupid. Privacy is not binary; it is possible to take a granular approach to it and reasonable to expect to be able to do so.

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[Anonymous Coward]

Just as likely he's using Google Chrome with XP Classic theme.

Re:So lemme get this straight...

[jim_v2000]

There is no problem to fix. Just manufactured outrage.

Filing as Jane Doe?

[whoda]

How can a legal-aged adult file as Jane Doe just because of her secret of being 'in the closet'?

Re:Filing as Jane Doe?

[Registered Coward v2]

How can a legal-aged adult file as Jane Doe just because of her secret of being 'in the closet'?

Simple - the judge gets to decide if her privacy rights outweigh the public interest in keeping lawsuit information available to the public. for more information see: http://www.legalmatch.com/law-library/article/filing-a-lawsuit-anonymously.html

To me allowing a Jane Doe suit in such cases is not unreasonable; whether or not her name wil eventually become public is another matter.

Re:Filing as Jane Doe?

[Shivetya]

Throw in a good chance that if her id is revealed her husband may be able to divorce on grounds of infidelity. Realistically, for her to declare that she is "in closet" and that Netflix did something to jeopardize her status she is effectively stating she is or has committed adultery. Needless to say that would put her on weaker footing should a divorce case come along.

So, protection from self incrimination?

Re:Filing as Jane Doe?

[Nadaka]

no. Being a lesbian does not mean she cheated on her husband, even if she is still married. For example, this is slashdot, I believe there are a lot of heterosexual men here who have never even touched a woman.

Re:Filing as Jane Doe?

[Anonymous Coward]

For example, this is slashdot, I believe there are a lot of heterosexual men here who have never even touched a woman.

They don't want to cheat on themselves

Re:Filing as Jane Doe?

[Verdatum]

Infidelity? WTF? That's a major leap of logic. Because she prefers chicks, she obviously cheated on her husband? Who modded this up?

Re:Filing as Jane Doe?

[Rogerborg]

Perhaps pecause being a lesbian in Los Angeles, CA (pop. 9,862,049) is very different from being a lesbian in Moss Landing, CA (pop. 304)? Not everyone is as broad minded as big city folks.

Re:Filing as Jane Doe?

[Anonymous Coward]

Not everyone is as broad minded as big city folks.

Nor is everyone as small minded as big city folks who, for all their self-proclaimed open-mindedness, are often anything but.

Re:Filing as Jane Doe?

[CoderJoe]

While I don't agree with the leap, I think I can kinda see where they got the idea. She prefers chicks and doesn't want anyone to know. Because she doesn't want anyone to know, she obviously has done something wrong, etc.

It is all a load of hogwash. That's the same logic that comes to the conclusion that if you use an envelope to mail something, you must be doing something wrong.

Re:Filing as Jane Doe?

[chrysrobyn]

Throw in a good chance that if her id is revealed her husband may be able to divorce on grounds of infidelity.

I'm not familiar with the odds, but there are a whole wide range of other possibilities. I went to college with a girl whose mom was a lesbian. She had married young to the guy who made all the sense in the world, who loved her and who treated her like a princess, assuming she'd fall in love eventually. Their marriage was consummated, producing a daughter. Mom figured things out, they divorced amicably (supposedly; personally, I can't imagine that going well), and the girl I went to school with would periodically talk about her mom and her mom's girlfriend just as any of us would periodically discuss our families.

Of course, there's also the artificial insemination route, but I think that's relatively uncommon. If she lives in a state where adoptive parents damn well better be straight, then remaining closeted may very well be in her best interests. I know of an instance where a lesbian wanted a child and couldn't afford anything other than "the natural route", so she found a "willing donor" and did things the natural way, finding her desire for a child stronger than her desire for a man not to touch her that way.

Re:Filing as Jane Doe?

[Anonymous Coward]

There's a child involved, so maybe her decision is more to do with protecting the child's sensibilities than her own. As far as I can see, whether she likes men or women isn't likely to influence her chances of infidelity in the slightest - OP might have been insinuating that she was in a sexually unffulfilling relationship and that it's not difficult to imagine she might seek relief elsewhere but that would still be a poor conclusion to jump to - plenty of straight people are in sexually unfulfilled relationships but it doesn't automatically infer they're all cheating.

Re:Filing as Jane Doe?

[Itninja]

Not everyone is as broad minded as big city folks.

The ignorance! It burns!

Re:Filing as Jane Doe?

[Rogerborg]

Not everyone is as broad minded as big city folks.

The ignorance! It burns!

Us big city folk with our fancy book-learnin' call that gasoline.

Re:Filing as Jane Doe?

[AnotherUsername]

Throw in a good chance that if her id is revealed her husband may be able to divorce on grounds of infidelity. Realistically, for her to declare that she is "in closet" and that Netflix did something to jeopardize her status she is effectively stating she is or has committed adultery. Needless to say that would put her on weaker footing should a divorce case come along.

So, protection from self incrimination?

• Or she is just trying to avoid the backlash of being a lesbian in a morally conservative area where people talk about homosexuals burning in a pit of fire for eternity.
• Maybe she wants to protect her children from the ridicule that comes with having a homosexual parent(kids are cruel).
• Perhaps her beliefs don't include divorce
• Maybe she loves the person she is married to, but she is just not sexually attracted to them, but she doesn't want to hurt them because of this.
• Or maybe she just wants to come out on her terms, and not because some company had the information with a bit too much personally identifiable information.

Just because someone is a homosexual doesn't mean that they are unfaithful.

Re:Filing as Jane Doe?

[casings]

Infidelity is a leap yes, not a "major: one, but certainly a leap. What isn't much of a leap however would be if she never told her husband (if she has one) that she is a lesbian, then that would be a CLEAR violation of trust. If you don't tell your partner that you aren't sexually attracted to them, then that is pretty indicative of a serious character flaw in that person.

Re:Filing as Jane Doe?

[psithurism]

Infidelity is a leap yes, not a "major: one, but certainly a leap. What isn't much of a leap however would be if she never told her husband (if she has one) that she is a lesbian, then that would be a CLEAR violation of trust. If you don't tell your partner that you aren't sexually attracted to them, then that is pretty indicative of a serious character flaw in that person.

Last time I told a girlfriend I wasn't sexually attracted to her...well I'll just say she found that to be a serious character flaw in my person, a CLEAR violation of trust.

Really, what did we expect her to do? We really have no knowledge about her situation or how her family and community would react if they discovered this. We don't even know if she is married. Do we have to assume she's evil?

Re:Filing as Jane Doe?

[fast turtle]

You're only partly right. Yes it does provide possible grounds for divorce but that's not the big issue. That revolves around Child Custody and Alimony. An argument that could be used due to her being gay is "Unfit as a mother". because of the risk of STD's such as Aids. If there is any money involved, it could have lots of bearing on how much alimony she's awarded. Note that Alimony is not Child Support, which is determined seperately and usually via published Guidelines.

Nope. The 5th ammendment has nothing to do with this matter as it's strictly a civil case. Now if there was the potential of "The State of" prosecuting her for a crime, then it's possible to supress this as evidence under the 5th but not really likely as its discovery was not by the Court or persons of the Court, nor is it held under Attorney/Client Privelage.

Re:Filing as Jane Doe?

[Verdatum]

Do we have to assume she's evil?

You must be new to the Internet. Welcome! :)

Re:Filing as Jane Doe?

[Anonymous Coward]

My left hand is a jealous bastard.

Re:Filing as Jane Doe?

[AK Marc]

We don't even know if she is married. Do we have to assume she's evil?

She is a lesbian mother that's in the closet. Given that a single person adopting is simply impossible in many locations, and the fact she's "in the closet" she isn't living openly with a same-sex partner. That leaves that she is (or was) in a relationship while lesbian. And that this relationship lasted long enough to result in a child. Such relationships are most likely marriages. So we don't know for sure, but it is most likely she was (or is) married. Systematic lying to the person you swore an oath to can be considered by some to be evil. My question is, why do you object to the most likely scenario?

Re:Filing as Jane Doe?

[AK Marc]

If she lives in a state where adoptive parents damn well better be straight, then remaining closeted may very well be in her best interests.

In many places, single people are not allowed to adopt. So, if she is in the closet and adopted, then she is married to a man. So it's most likely (at least in my opinion) that she gave birth to the child.

Re:Filing as Jane Doe?

[chrysrobyn]

In many places, single people are not allowed to adopt. So, if she is in the closet and adopted, then she is married to a man. So it's most likely (at least in my opinion) that she gave birth to the child.

In 1992, a single female friend of my mother adopted a little boy. I believe the legal adoption was in Virginia, although her residence was in Arizona. Based on what else I know of this person, I cannot guess if this was a rare case where single adoptions were accepted, if times have changed, or if fraud was involved. While none of those three would surprise me, it had not occurred to me that single people could not adopt.

Re:Filing as Jane Doe?

[AK Marc]

The stated policy on adoptions in Texas and Alaska (the two states I've lived in, so I only know the rules there) state that a child needs to be raised by two parents. One of the stated reasons is that it provides redundancy in the case of loss of one. There may be exceptions available, but the child welfare codes are designed to create two-parent families only.

I believe the legal adoption was in Virginia, although her residence was in Arizona.

Given that the adoption was not where she resided, I would guess, without knowing anything else, that the reason is that the rules are different in VA, and that singles wanting to be parents would exploit the few places with the most lenient rules. It's not like there is a shortage of orphans needing homes in any location, so for the adoption to be elsewhere either means she was baby shopping (I want dark hair, blue eyes, female, whatever), had some other connection (met the child before, was acquainted with family, visits the other area often and ran into him at some point), or chose the location of adoption based on ease of fulfilling the requirements.

I'm not saying it's impossible everywhere. I'm stating that it is (without specific exceptions granted I'm unaware of) not allowed in the two states I know the general rules for and at least frowned upon elsewhere. They are so odd to go so far as not ever terminating parental rights (such as for a father raping his child or such) but just removing visitation, and it takes someone else adopting the child to form a new 2-parent family to actually remove the abusive/violent/whatever parent from the legal role of parent. They are happy to in many cases, but they won't do it unless it makes a new 2-parent family.

Re:Filing as Jane Doe?

[gruber_aekdb]

hey! I'm going to touch a women... Its not my fault my super-model girlfriend keeps getting called away for photo shoots before I can introduce her to anyone! She's in Austria now doing a skiing themed shoot for playboy I think... ;)

Re:Filing as Jane Doe?

[psithurism]

We don't even know if she is married. Do we have to assume she's evil?

why do you object to the most likely scenario?

You're analysis is superb and rather likely, but still full of assumptions. There are ways to conceive children without marriage such willing donors or sperm banks. Maybe she's bi but bisexual-porno-freak-mom did not sound as good as "lesbian mother". Maybe she got married without trying women and discovered she liked women a few years into the relationship and either kept quite from her super conservative husband, or shared it with her supportive husband and either way they stayed together for the kids and appearances. And the quote that we draw all these conclusions from does not mention her hiding this from a husband:

“were her sexual orientation public knowledge, it would negatively affect her ability to pursue her livelihood and support her family and would hinder her and her children’s ability to live peaceful lives.”

I object to the I gpppp's (right # of 'p's?) Idea that she does not deserve to file as a Jane Doe as her husband ought to know when I must conclude he missed the stream of lesbian erotica from netflix that she shared with her girlfriends on their frequent sleepovers, or however we might consider she was lying to him.

Outed by movie rentals?

[grapeape]

"The member’s movie data exposes a Netflix member’s personal interest and/or struggles with various highly personal issues, including sexuality, mental illness, recovery from alcoholism, and victimization from incest, physical abuse, domestic violence, adultery, and rape."

Isn't this a bit of a stretch. I've rented a rather broad range of films, over the past year some of the films I have watched include Apt Pupil, Lords of Dogtown, Girl Interrupted, A History of violence, A Beautiful Mind, Brokeback Mountain and Super High Me. Evidently I'm a mentally disturbed,abusive, homosexual, drug abusing, skateboarding, autistic nazi and didn't know it.

The woman who was outed wasn't outed by her movie choices but by her paranoia leading to her own disclosure.

Re:Outed by movie rentals?

[ViViDboarder]

Exactly what I was going to post! This is crazy. Also, I'd really like to know how someone drew the conclusion that she was a Closet Lesbian from her movie rentals AND that someone randomly picked her out of the huge database AND then took the time to find out who she was and then took the time to notify all her friends... All this for the interest of being malicious towards a stranger they will probably never see...

Seems a little far-fetched.

Also, the summary is poorly written because it makes it seem like the Zipcodes and Birthdays have been released when they haven't. http://www.wired.com/images_blogs/threatlevel/2009/12/doe-v-netflix.pdf

http://it.slashdot.org/story/07/11/27/1334244/Anonymity-of-Netflix-Prize-Dataset-Broken Shows that it's possible, but it's not like anyone could draw a conclusion on Sexuality with any certainty by those means.

Also, after reading the article it seems like they HAVEN'T released Birthdays and Zip Codes but that this is only planned for the second iteration. They only had unique ids for users and ratings... The privacy was breached by people datamining other resources. From what I gathered... the people got the identities of people by matching ratings with IMDB ratings... Which in that case I don't think Netflix really provides any more information about someone than they have already made public via IMDB.

Re:Outed by movie rentals?

[Anonymous Coward]

Seems a little far-fetched.

Wired

Also, the summary is poorly written...

kdawson
Wired + kdawson = (crap)^2

Re:Outed by movie rentals?

[Spazztastic]

Isn't this a bit of a stretch. I've rented a rather broad range of films [snip]

I share a Netflix account with my mom. I have the movies go to her address and I use the streaming to my 360 at my apartment. Going by what you mentioned, they must think I'm a menopausal woman who has an infatuation with James Bond.

Re:Outed by movie rentals?

[kabloom]

Either it's a privacy violation, or it's not. It shouldn't have anything to do with whether the woman is a Lesbian, or whether that particular fact can be inferred from the data. (Certainly there are easier facts to infer that would be equally if not more compromising to privacy, such as so-and-so rented pornos.)

Re:Outed by movie rentals?

[willworkforbeer]

Honey, is that you?

Re:Outed by movie rentals?

[Anonymous Coward]

"Seems a little far-fetched"

Have you ever heard of /b/ ?

Re:Outed by movie rentals?

[ViViDboarder]

And I don't think it is. Having read the part of the suit where it mentions what exactly was released by Netflix and how they claim Netflix "should have been aware" that this would result in users being identified is a bit far fetched.

From what I read I think Netflix did a sufficient job of protecting privacy. At least done to the best of the companies knowledge.

There happened to be someone out there smarter though. Someone who figured out a way to ID people given this very obscure information. I'd say it's akin to someone hacking into a system and obtaining personal information. They took measures to prevent it but if someone was really going after you it has been shown that some information can be gathered about the users.

I guess I just don't feel like Netflix is at fault here and that they should not be liable for this sort of thing. Law suits are already getting out of hand here.

Re:Outed by movie rentals?

[CorporateSuit]

Via email this morning, asking how the picture quality was, I found out that last night my daughter watched Baby Geniuses while my wife and I were at her company's Christmas party. Do you think I'll ever be able to run for public office with that kind of thing on my record? Do you? Just by posting this, I'm probably going to have to start over with a new slashdot account.

Re:Outed by movie rentals?

[AK Marc]

Either it's a privacy violation, or it's not. It shouldn't have anything to do with whether the woman is a Lesbian, or whether that particular fact can be inferred from the data.

But it does. If my privacy is violated, then the judge will say "you have proven your case, but you lost nothing, so I hereby find for the plaintiff for $1."

Not only need there be a violation of the TOS or whatever, but that it had to cause harm. That's why the lesbian factor matters. And if she wasn't outed, but "could have been" then she didn't suffer a loss, unless she went to therapy over the worry or such. Not to mention that just because she is personally identifiable, doesn't mean she ever was, or that she was one of those in the 87% that was identifiable, or that if she was linked to her queue that it would show her to be lesbian, or that outing her happened, or that the outing caused her real harm.

I think that there are so many things that would need to be proven to show that her privacy was *actually* violated in a manner that caused any harm at all, that she can't get anything out of this case. From the lawyer's history, I'd say he wanted his name in the news and wanted to try out some legal arguments. If he loses, it's free publicity and gets some things tested in court for future plans. If he wins, it's free money. He may just be hoping for the settle, because if he loses, Netflix will still be out lots of money in lawyer fees.

Re:Outed by movie rentals?

[Fnord666]

Also, the summary is poorly written because...

That never happens around here. We have a fine editorial staff to handle those sorts of things. In fact, I can think of only one ...

Posted by kdawson on Friday December 18, @09:32AM

Never mind.

Re:Outed by movie rentals?

[kabloom]

So there's probably a better test case than Jane Doe who's a closeted lesbian who thinks that someone can infer her sexual orientation from her video rentals. Think along the lines of the outspoken politician who can be badly embarassed (perhaps to the point of a forced resignation) by demonstrating that he's rented pornos.

Re:Outed by movie rentals?

[AK Marc]

Can you rent pornos from Netflix?

Um...

[fredklein]

If a data set reveals a person's ZIP code, birthdate and gender, there's an 87 percent chance that the person can be uniquely identified

What idiot answers all those questions correctly?

Re:Um...

[Anonymous Coward]

I am 12 years old and what is this?

Re:Um...

[Anonymous Coward]

I do not want to be perceived as rude, but I believe your mother could be one of them.

Re:Um...

[djdbass]

So there is an 87% chance that the person can be uniquely identified.
Though taking your point into account means there's only a 50% chance of that.

And then looking at that 50% chance, there's a 50% chance that that is right.
So the overall chance approaches zero. Amirite?

Re:Um...

[Bakkster]

Yeah, only people who want deliveries to their actual house give their correct ZIP code!

Re:Um...

[fredklein]

Do you also give your Gender and Birthdate in order to get stuff delivered?

So...yeah.

Re:Um...

[Bakkster]

Do you also give your Gender and Birthdate in order to get stuff delivered?

Only when I'm being facetious ;)

Re:Um...

[Anonymous Coward]

The kind of idiot that wants their Netflix DVDs to reach their letterbox, their credit card verification to pass, and their mail to not be addressed to "Mrs John Smith".

Re:Um...

[fredklein]

The kind of idiot that wants their Netflix DVDs to reach their letterbox

It's called a PO box. Look into it.

(for all I know, netflix won't deliver to one)

their credit card verification to pass

Requires neither Gender, nor birthdate.

and their mail to not be addressed to "Mrs John Smith".

I prefer "occupant". Oh, and an accurate name again requires neither Gender, nor birthdate.

If you don't have anything to hide

[KnownIssues]

Oh wait. What if you do?

They should've redacted such entries

[davidwr]

When some government agencies give statistical reports, they are very careful to suppress statistics that could lead to disclosure.

For example, in school accountability ratings and test results, if fewer than a certain number of students in a given grouping take the test, the average test scores for that grouping are suppressed. If I'm a parent of one of 2 White, non-Hispanic 3rd graders in a school and I know my Little Johnny scored a 73 on his Science standardized test, and I find out the average was a 60, and I know who the other White, non-Hispanic 3rd grader is, I now know his score. Oops.

Re:They should've redacted such entries

[nomadic]

According to the Complaint, netflix did do perturbation of the numbers but didn't do enough of it.

not quite

[nomadic]

She signed up for this netflix thing, then found out some actual researchers, not hypothetical ones, cracked the publicly available data for a couple of users. She then joined a class action suit but didn't use her real name.

Congratulations! Now the world _knows_.

[Golddess]

So while before all that was available was a list of rented films which she seems to think indicates that whoever rents them can indicate that the watcher is gay (which I'm having a hard time making the leap from "if someone watches movie X, Y, and Z, that means they are gay), now the whole world knows she is gay.

Where are the photos?

[Vinegar Joe]

Is she hot?

Re:Where are the photos?

[Anonymous Coward]

No, this is a real-life lesbian, not a "lesiban" from porn. She probably looks like Rosie O'Donnell.

Re:Where are the photos?

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.babble.com/CS/blogs/famecrawler/2007/12/23-End%20of%20Month/rosie-oterror.jpg

Re:Where are the photos?

[LoverOfJoy]

Do a google image search on Jane Doe. It looks like she's had plastic surgery numerous times but most if not all of her images are not particularly attractive.

Re:Where are the photos?

[mrs clear plastic]

Are you also a lesbian? If not, then you are irrelevant.

Re:Where are the photos?

[Belial6]

Besides, who cares about a woman being lesbian besides other lesbians. Me, I want to know about the super hot bi chicks. That, and it is ridiculous for the previous poster to ask if she is hot. There is no way for him to get an answer because looking at the a photo won't help since by definition, the best looking women are the ones who will sleep with me.

Wait a minute...

[Anonymous Coward]

I watch movies with women gettin' it on together all the time. I guess my wife is in for quite a surprise when she finds out Netflix researchers discover she's a lesbian.

Don't you need to have actual damages?

[joeflies]

The way that I thought that it worked was that you sue in civil court when you actuall suffer damages even when the other party was doing something illegal.

For instance, you can't sue a drunk driver for almost hitting your car. You could press that they did something illegal and have him charged in criminal court, but there's no payday in that. Given that these types of cases seem to be this lawyer's modus operandi, I'm thinking that this case is more about the payday and not about building stronger standards for privacy.

Re:Don't you need to have actual damages?

[nomadic]

The way that I thought that it worked was that you sue in civil court when you actuall suffer damages even when the other party was doing something illegal.

In cases at law, for example tort or contract cases, you generally do. This is a case at equity, so the plaintiffs are trying to get injunctive relief (also attorneys fees, but that's considered ancillary to the injunction).

Stop giving out personal info that isn't needed

[harmonise]

if a data set reveals a person's ZIP code, birthdate and gender, there's an 87 percent chance that the person can be uniquely identified.

Why are you giving Netflix your birthdate and gender in the first place? I never give those things to companies, and if I can't avoid it (forced to enter something when signing up) I give bogus information. Neither of those are any of Netflix's business.

Re:Stop giving out personal info that isn't needed

[Anonymous Coward]

Why are you giving Netflix your birthdate and gender in the first place? I never give those things to companies, and if I can't avoid it (forced to enter something when signing up) I give bogus information. Neither of those are any of Netflix's business.

Yes, blame the victim. If she was told by Netflix in a written agreement that her data would not be disclosed as to be able to uniquely identify her, Netflix is in the wrong if they disclosed this data. Simple as that, irregardless of the stupidity of the person who trusted that the legally binding contract would not be broken.

Re:Stop giving out personal info that isn't needed

[aicrules]

Certainly if you think some important secret of yours will be revealed by giving Netflix that information, you shouldn't give it. However, for me, I like giving them that information because they have used it to recommend movies quite successfully. I don't care if anybody knows I watched Kate & Leopold three times in a row. I'm not going to go out of my way to post what I watch on my FB profile, but if it was there, I wouldn't care.

Re:Stop giving out personal info that isn't needed

[harmonise]

I wasn't blaming the victim and I never mentioned the victim. You put that connection together yourself so you should think about why YOU are blaming the victim. And "irregardless" isn't a word.

Re:Stop giving out personal info that isn't needed

[Anonymous Coward]

If I can find it in the registration form, I always select "Zulu". I like that.

Re:Stop giving out personal info that isn't needed

[BOFslime]

OH-EM-GEE! they also have my FULL NAME and my CREDIT CARD INFORMATION! What was I thinking giving a company this information! (And they only thing they ask for is birthYEAR not birthdate. I'd rather get recommendation's for twenty-something male's then the chick flick crap a 30 something female would receive.. but hey.. to each their own.)

Re:Stop giving out personal info that isn't needed

[10101001 10101001]

Why are you giving Netflix your birthdate and gender in the first place? (emphasis mine)

Yes, blame the victim.

I wasn't blaming the victim and I never mentioned the victim.

Your use of "in the first place" was being used to imply blame. Compare to "Why are you giving Netflix your birthday and gender?" The form you use is pejorative to the actions as committed versus what actions should have been committed. Similarly, the form is used in declarative statements to imply support of one's previous choices in comparison to what is being possibly suggested. For example, "We relied, in the first place, on Netflix's privacy policy."

Re:Stop giving out personal info that isn't needed

[KraftDinner]

The issue I have sometimes with giving a fake birthday is that it's usually a security question when you go to try the "forgot password" function. If I were to give a different birthday every time, I wouldn't remember which is for which. I suppose I could just give the same fake birthday every time, though.

Re:Stop giving out personal info that isn't needed

[Anonymous Coward]

if a data set reveals a person's ZIP code, birthdate and gender, there's an 87 percent chance that the person can be uniquely identified.

Why are you giving Netflix your birthdate and gender in the first place? I never give those things to companies, and if I can't avoid it (forced to enter something when signing up) I give bogus information. Neither of those are any of Netflix's business.

im assuming the DOB is necessary for renting R rated movies?

Netflix should default to month and year, not dd/mm/yy

BTW, great sig.

Re:Stop giving out personal info that isn't needed

[Anonymous Coward]

Certainly if you think some important secret of yours will be revealed by giving Netflix that information, you shouldn't give it. However, for me, I like giving them that information because they have used it to recommend movies quite successfully. I don't care if anybody knows I watched Kate & Leopold three times in a row. I'm not going to go out of my way to post what I watch on my FB profile, but if it was there, I wouldn't care.

The problem with this is not everyone is as savvy internet wise and even life wise as most slashdotters (hard to believe, I know).

Its well known that Facebooks privacy setting are opaque and confusing, and the default settings are anything but private. What you may not mind sharing, someone else may, and individuals preferences should be at least taken into consideration. The netflix data should have been at least tokenized, before being distributed willy nilly

Re:Stop giving out personal info that isn't needed

[Overzeetop]

I usually use the first day of my birth month, and the correct year. Nobody needs anything more accurate than that. Of course, now that I think about it, I suppose I should use February 29th of my birth year. The double bonus is that that date doesn't exist.

Re:Stop giving out personal info that isn't needed

[ncc74656]

I suppose I could just give the same fake birthday every time, though.

I usually give them the month and year, but leave the day at 1 (and no, I wasn't born on the 1st of the month). If it's optional, though, I just won't give them anything at all.

Re:Stop giving out personal info that isn't needed

[psithurism]

I wouldn't think a secret of mine will be revealed by giving netflix information, because I expect netflix not to disclose that information to random 3rd parties!

Information like birthday and gender are a reasonable thing to provide to a big, known legit company that will be billing you. I've provided it to many companies before. I think it's unreasonable to expect her to predict that that information would later come back to haunt her.

Re:Stop giving out personal info that isn't needed

[Elshar]

Sure it is. It's a double-negative meaning "regarding". Sort of like ((-1 * 1) * -1), which ends up being 1. Just most people don't understand the concept of multi-negative words actually being positive instead of extra-negative.

Stop.

[Anonymous Coward]

Stop watching gay movies. This will prevent people from learning that you are... gay.

Jane Doe - If we don't know who the mom is..

[log0n]

then how was she outed?

The closet can be a scary, stupid place

[name_already_taken]

Speaking as a gay guy with a lot of gay and lesbian friends, I can tell you that some people get really worked up over being "in the closet". They can start to worry about really stupid things that are outside of the bounds of possibility, and work themselves into all kinds of trouble.

Case in point: a friend of mine got herself fired over this. She knew that her supervisor didn't like gay people and so she was in the closet, as far as work was concerned. She got called up for jury duty. The court case didn't last long at all, but in the meantime, one of our mutual friends' father passed away. So, my friend was invited to the funeral which happened to fall on the day after her jury duty ended. She was so worked up over the idea that her boss would figure out that she's a lesbian if she took a personal day to go to her gay friend's dad's funeral that she lied and told her boss that she was still on jury duty for the day of the funeral. Well, the boss didn't like her and he called the court clerk to confirm that she was still on jury duty - and then fired her for lying about it.

Had she just took a personal day and said "I'm going to the funeral of a friend's dad" nothing would have happened. As far as I know, there's no mechanism by which you can figure out if the relatives of a dead person (whose name you don't have) are gay or not.

Maybe this lawsuit lady should read up on the Streisand Effect (you know her name's going to come out eventually), stop worrying so much about what other people think about her sexual orientation, and concentrate on living her life. Can she truly be deluded enough to think that anyone in her life (work, social, government or otherwise) is going to trawl netflix's database to figure out if she's a lesbian and then use that information against her?

Seriously, this is like when my boss didn't want to have his pay directly deposited because he thought the payroll company could snoop in his bank account. It's just not grounded in reality.

Re:The closet can be a scary, stupid place

[forand]

Seriously, this is like when my boss didn't want to have his pay directly deposited because he thought the payroll company could snoop in his bank account. It's just not grounded in reality.

While they may not be able to see your transactions any company authorized to direct deposit is authorized to deduct money from your account.

Re:The closet can be a scary, stupid place

[Anonymous Coward]

You should meet my sister. SHE LOVES to snoop thru peoples information. Its creepy as hell. I have told her this on many occasions. There are people out there who not only would do it but LIKE to do it. You would be massively surprised on the information that is out there about people.

But in general you are right. Dont worry about it.

Re:The closet can be a scary, stupid place

[Anonymous Coward]

I have a friend like this as well. She actually was just coerced into quitting because she told a female co-worker that she loved her and it caused a big problem. If she'd been more level-headed about it, I doubt she'd have disclosed that information before being 100% sure about the woman's reaction and even after, when they were trying to coerce her into quitting, she'd have been more level-headed about the problem if she hadn't kept saying things like 'They'll out me and the whole town will hate me.' It isn't even the town she lives in.

Re:The closet can be a scary, stupid place

[Anonymous Coward]

Seriously, this is like when my boss didn't want to have his pay directly deposited because he thought the payroll company could snoop in his bank account. It's just not grounded in reality.

While they may not be able to see your transactions any company authorized to direct deposit is authorized to deduct money from your account.

They can fix payroll errors. They cannot legally go in an wipe your account or view transactions with others. Banks would not allow that either. Still not grounded in reality.

Re:The closet can be a scary, stupid place

[mrs clear plastic]

May I please fully agree with your essay.

I can further suggest, however, that the woman who's the subject of this article take a look at organizations such as Out and Equal, who make it their mission to support a safe working environment for GLBT community (gay lesbian bisexual, and transgender) members.

Re:The closet can be a scary, stupid place

[david_thornley]

Speaking as a heterosexual male, if I were to hit on one of my female co-workers, and she reported it, there would be consequences to me.

Re:The closet can be a scary, stupid place

[Anonymous Coward]

This is off-topic but I really like your sig. Every time I see someone with "Slashdot doesn't have a -1 disagree option" (maybe it is just one person but I see it a lot) or something like that I get the almost irresistible urge to moderate them -1 Troll. I don't moderate people down because I disagree with them but I also have an innate hatred for strangers telling me what to do. Also having something inflammatory/political in your sig makes me want to mod you down no matter how reasonable your post is.

Posting anonymously for obvious reasons.

Re:eat my shorts slashdot !!

[Yvan256]

99.999% chance of AC being Bart Simpson.

Ridiculous privacy revealed. We should say NO

[Kohath]

This case shows the ridiculous extremes that "privacy" has come to. Netflix, apparently, has some sort of affirmative obligation to help this woman hide her illicit sexual escapades. The government is going to require Netflix to help cover up for her proclivities.

Lesbian romps are voluntary. Using Netflix is voluntary. Telling Netflix about yourself is voluntary. Netflix voluntarily rents you videos. Every aspect of this case involves people freely engaging in voluntary action. And now we're being asked to get the government involved to force Netflix to hide information against their will, and, by the way, hide it retroactive to several years ago.

Why shouldn't we just say no to people like this? No, we won't help you hide. No, we won't force other people (against their will) to help you hide. No. If you want to hide the things you do, try being more discreet next time.

Re:Ridiculous privacy revealed. We should say NO

[tilandal]

Video rental records are protected information under existing federal law. Netflix released rental information to the public. Therefore they are liable for damages if the information was personally identifiable. End of story.

Re:Ridiculous privacy revealed. We should say NO

[Kohath]

Lots of things are against the law in totalitarian states. Injustice prevails where force dictates action. This case is unjust. If the law supports this case, then the law is unjust.

Re:Ridiculous privacy revealed. We should say NO

[tilandal]

Somehow I don't find that protecting the rights of corporations to do whatever they want with your purchase history to be a noble and just cause.

Re:Ridiculous privacy revealed. We should say NO

[Kohath]

Somehow I don't find that protecting the rights of corporations to do whatever they want with your purchase history to be a noble and just cause.

Somehow I don't find that protecting the rights of [people] to [act freely] with [information that they rightly know] to be a noble and just cause.

Fixed that for you. You are anti-freedom. I am pro-freedom.

Re:Ridiculous privacy revealed. We should say NO

[tilandal]

I am sure you would love to have all your personal information published. Where you shop, what you eat, what you buy, who you call, what you read, what you watch on TV, what websites you browse. After all your ISP knows your entire online history, they should be able to act freely with that information. You phone company should be able to do whatever they want with your phone records. Your credit card company, perfectly fine for them to sell your shopping history. Its their information after all. Hey, even Uncle Sam can get into the act and sell your tax returns to advertisers. That would raise billions of dollars. Budget deficit solved! You are so smart.

Re:Ridiculous privacy revealed. We should say NO

[psithurism]

Sure, using netflix is voluntary, but she did not volunteer to have them divulge personal information about her. In fact they promised her they would not in their privacy policy: http://www.netflix.com/Popup?id=5136#collection. Are you saying she has to conform to their terms of service but the service she is paying for should have the right to screw her anyway they like regardless of what they promised specifically not to do or we live in a "totalitarion state"? (http://yro.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1483310&cid=30488934). I disagree; the case IS just and so is the law. (well we'll see. The two of us don't know the specifics of the case, 12people we'll be so informed their ears bleed and probably be in a much better position to decide.)

Re:Ridiculous privacy revealed. We should say NO

[Kohath]

How about if I hide my info myself (if I want it hidden) instead of hiring the government to force innocent people to do it against their will for my benefit?

Re:Ridiculous privacy revealed. We should say NO

[AaronMK]

First, since when was being a lesbian illicit?! You say "No, we won't help you hide." as if she has done something despicable that the public has a right to know about. All the information likely you have about this person is that she is a lesbian, yet you conclude she engages "illicit sexual escapades" and "lesbian romps".

But let us forget the fact for a moment that you have drawn a lot of conclusions based on very limited information. You then talk as if her use of a voluntary service is something that gives the company providing that service the right to indiscriminately publicize details of that use.

"If you want to hide the things you do, try being more discreet next time."

Existing privacy laws require companies to be discreet when it comes personally identifiable rental histories. It is a reasonable for her to expect that a company with which she is doing business will obey the law. It was the company's failure to be discreet, not hers.

Re:Ridiculous privacy revealed. We should say NO

[tilandal]

How about if it were illegal to publish my personal information without my express consent? Oh wait, it is. Do you know why? Because unless you live in a tent, keep all your money in cash, get payed in cash, and don't file your taxes there is no way to keep your personal information hidden. Privacy laws exist because it is not reasonable to expect a person to live like that.

Re:Ridiculous privacy revealed. We should say NO

[Kohath]

How about if it were illegal to publish my personal information without my express consent?

That would infringe free speech and freedom of the press in a very obvious way.

Re:Ridiculous privacy revealed. We should say NO

[concept14]

No mod points today, so I'll just point out that if you had not written "illicit sexual escapades" and "lesbian romps", I wouldn't call you a troll.

Ummm, yeah I'm thinking...

[gfolkert]

I completely agree, even then... let us consider how many people are in a specific Zip Code, especially in places that are super heavily populated... 87% chance? doubtful.

87% of all statistics are pulled from /dev/ass, including this one.

Re:Ummm, yeah I'm thinking...

[crashumbc]

Take 50 years multiply by 365...

That 18,250 UNIQUE possible people in a given zip code.

Now double because you include gender ( I'll assume no aliens.

that's 36,500 people if you spread them out equally in a given zip code, that you could uniquely identify...

Except in heavy urban areas I doubt there are many 5 digit zip codes that even have that many people...

now granted people aren't spread out evenly by birth date. But its not hard to imagine that there are MANY unique matches with that info...

 

"state-of-the-art defense" and strict liability.

[gandhi_2]

The suit turns on the question of whether Netflix should have known that their dataset's anonymity could be broken, two years before researchers demonstrated that.

This is called a "state-of-the-art" defense, and generally doesn't work.

State of the art defense is the defense that permits a manufacturer to avoid liability in a design defect case if at the time of manufacture there was no safer design available, or in a failure to warn case if at the time of manufacture there was no way the manufacturer could have known of the danger he/she failed to warn against.

Lets say I was making Asbestos oven mitts, no one knew it was dangerous. The state of the oven mitt industry and materials science (the art) was that Asbestos was fine. Then, 50 years later we find out it's dangerous. The lawsuits will probably prevail because the "state of the art" defense doesn't stand up to strict liability.

On the upside, she'll probably make some new friends in PTA. And who doesn't love hot buttered soccer moms?

In that I do not use NetFlix, I have some question

[pgmrdlm]

When the movies are sent to you, do they arive in any type of packaging that indicate what type of movie you are getting? Or, as when ordering from an adult store it comes in generic brown paper with an alias name of the company that sent it? I always look foward to my brown paper mail deliveries by the way.

Could who ever delivered the package to her door have figured out her taste of movies?

Which brings up another question I have. When ordering the movies, is the order a post card type of request or a sealed envelope?

Shoot, how many marketing firms have been sued for this same type of privacy issue?

5 out of 11 people in the Cleveland ohio(now you know where I live, kind of) like to watch porn who were born in 1959(how old am I really?) or earlier. Males make up 80 percent of this catagory with women all admiting they LOVE porn(Am I male or female).

I understand her concern for privacy, I just don't see enough information being provided to support that concern.

Privacy concerns

[chadplusplus]

I didn't RTFA, but exactly how detailed is this information? Will my facade of sophistication bolstered by my renting/viewing of foreign films remain intact? Or will it be torn asunder when it is revealed I only fast forwarded to the sex scenes?

Re:In that I do not use NetFlix, I have some quest

[Sancho]

Movies are sent in a red Netflix envelope. There is a perforated piece of paper with your address which covers one side of the envelope (it covers the side with Netflix's return shipping address--the envelope you receive is the envelope you ship it back in.)

The movie itself is in a sleeve inside the envelope. The sleeve contains the movie, a description, and a barcode. A correctly inserted movie will only have the barcode revealed through a little window, presumably to make processing easier at the shipment facilities.

See:
http://blogs.courierpostonline.com/mojodojo/files/2009/03/netflix-1.jpg

http://i.zdnet.com/blogs/netflixenvelope.jpg

This is really cool.

[v(*_*)vvvv]

So anonymity in this case was simply a type of encryption. Making information less obvious doesn't mean the information is lost. True anonymity can only be achieved by purging information, and hence only no information is truly anonymous. Or is it?

Cracking google's anonymity code is another related topic. It is good that these companies anonymity cards are being challenged.

Re:"state-of-the-art defense" and strict liability

[Anonymous Coward]

Keep in mind that strict liability only applies to tort cases and that the plaintiff must demonstrate that the tort actually happened. That is not the case in this case. Yeah, I said it that way.

Should Netflix have known?

[awilden]

There are a lot of comments about whether she could/should have been outed by the data set or not, but nobody answered the question as to whether Netflix really should have known that the data they published was personally identifiable. The answer is an unmitigated 'yes'. People have been working on privacy in databases issues for a very long time (US census in the late 1800s, anyone?) but with the EU's strict privacy regulations, it's 'recently' become an important area of computer science research (see the "Privacy in Statistical Databases" conferences like PSD 2008).

The fact is though that there are several standard techniques that are well understood, easy to implement, and would have let them release the data without releasing any information. Probably the best fit would be to just lie about the zip codes -- take the data and make sure that there are at least n people in each "zip code", merging adjacent codes into one until you get enough to protect the innocent. There's also a lot of research about generating fake records that maintain similar statistical properties to the original data set. Both techniques do result in some loss of information, but remember that's a good thing because it helps protect the privacy. Besides, if for example I live in Green Bay, I really fail to see how much additional information can be gained by associating my records with the individual zip code for Green Bay instead of grouping everyone together into a single zip for the entire city.

Re:Should Netflix have known?

[bongk]

I disagree with the parent's suggestion that they could have changed the data by combining zip codes without impacting the results. From what I've read about the netflix prize competition, the people involved really really had to work for the last quarter a percent or so to get to the 10% goal. Different zip codes in the same area could affect the results at this level - if you live downtown vs. the suburbs, etc.

Re:Should Netflix have known?

[Fnord666]

I disagree with the parent's suggestion that they could have changed the data by combining zip codes without impacting the results. From what I've read about the netflix prize competition, the people involved really really had to work for the last quarter a percent or so to get to the 10% goal. Different zip codes in the same area could affect the results at this level - if you live downtown vs. the suburbs, etc.

Just so you know, no data about zip codes, gender, or birthdates were released in the datasets for the netflix prize competition.
Each row contained exactly three things:

1. a randomly assigned user number
2. a movie identifier number
3. the rating that user gave that movie

No other information was contained in the dataset or released about the user. The way that the anonymity was broken was to look for similar or identical ratings for the same set of films associated with a user on a more public database where the user was identified. The thing is that if Jane Doe has rated these same films on a more public database, her secret is out anyway. If she hasn't, then the de-anonymizing won't work. Either way I do not believe that the netflix prize datasets compromised her secret.

Re:In that I do not use NetFlix, I have some quest

[ncc74656]

When the movies are sent to you, do they arive in any type of packaging that indicate what type of movie you are getting?

Netflix sends movies in a Tyvek sleeve with a label with the title, plot synopsis, and a few other details. This, in turn, goes in a paper envelope that hides everything on the label, except a barcode. I don't know what is encoded in the barcode; if I had to guess, it's a unique identifier Netflix uses for inventory purposes. Without a way to tie that to a movie title, the only way someone's going to know what you're ordering from Netflix would be if someone intercepted your mail and pulled out the movie.

Re:In that I do not use NetFlix, I have some quest

[pgmrdlm]

Thank you for the links. Like I said, i do not belong to NetFlix so I did not know for sure how the packaging was done.

a mashup away from a serious problem

[patSPLAT]

Most repliers are unsympathetic to this complaint, but if this dataset was hooked up to an online tool which quickly did the look-up it would be a major issue.

Zipcodes known to help uniquely identify

[realsilly]

I've done enough work for companies in my years to know that zipcodes can be used to uniquely identify individuals. Since there are still parts of this country in which a person may own a very large piece of land and Zipcodes use the +4 to determine specific blocks within a zip code range, then all one needs is a name or the other info mentioned above to uniquely identify a person. This has been known by banks and the post office for as long as the +4 has been around. Banks have strict guidelines around uniquely identified people and what they must do if they are identified when dealing with offers of credit.

Netflix works with the post office for mass mailing, they would be aware of the ways to uniquely identify people.

Who am I?

[Anonymous Coward]

10-14-1986, male, 64111.

Go!

Re:Who am I?

[base3]

Trollaxor.

Re:Who am I?

[dazedNconfuzed]

Don't know your name, but you live with someone in an apartment and want to buy a Welsh Terrier.

Ok, i read the article and I still have questions

[pgmrdlm]

Netflix did not give out zip code, age, or gender. That was being offered in the second phase of the contest.
*****
The suit is also asking the court to stop Netflix from launching its promised second contest to improve the recommendations — this time giving out user data that includes ZIP codes, ages and gender, along with movie ratings and ID numbers substituted for user names
****

The actual data given out, which the law suit was filed against says 2 data bases with only the following description of what was in it.
****
In order to get a better movie recommendation algorithm, the online DVD rental company gave more than 50,000 Netflix Prize contestants two massive datasets. The first included 100 million movie ratings, along with the date of the rating, a unique ID number for the subscriber, and the movie info. Based on this data from 480,000 customers, contestants had to come up with a recommendation algorithm that could predict 10 percent better than Netflix how those same subscribers rated other movies.
****

Ok, I'm confused. I do not see anything in the first descript that would identify a person. The zip code, age, gender was NOT given out. YET.

They talk about two data base's, but only describe the contents of one. They talk about future release of data. Which is age, gender, zip. But it hasn't been given out.

What type of information was in the second data base.

What specificatly is the data the origional law suit was filed about??????

I know, stupid questions.. But there is somethign missing here, or I'm just stupid. or blind(this I will admit to).

Correlation?

[johntkucz]

I agree this was poor and invasive on netflix's part, but how was "suit known as Doe v. Netflix " "outing a lesbian"? Like netflix released information of a bunch of gay movie rentals??? releasing private info is fail, I just don't see the correlation with the lesbian woman.

I totally agree

[name_already_taken]

If one my co-workers (of either sex) told me they loved me, that would make working with them at least a little uncomfortable.

Getting in trouble just for the fact that you're attracted to people of whichever gender is wrong.

Getting in trouble for making a co-worker uncomfortable by telling them you love them is a legitimate thing. It's totally inappropriate.

I will admit that in the past I did once have a crush on a male co-worker, but I would never have let him know. People have to behave professionally in the workplace so that everyone can be comfortable working there.

Re:I totally agree

[St.Creed]

If one my co-workers (of either sex) told me they loved me, that would make working with them at least a little uncomfortable.

No it wouldn't - you'd never have to get your own coffee again. And you'd have them bring nice sandwiches for lunch. I can see all kinds of possibilities to make your life pretty comfortable :)

Getting in trouble for making a co-worker uncomfortable by telling them you love them is a legitimate thing. It's totally inappropriate.

I make my co-workers uncomfortable all the time, by telling them they're idiots for instance, or just displaying my superior intelligence(*). I'm quite sure some of them would by now prefer to have me say that I love them :)

I will admit that in the past I did once have a crush on a male co-worker, but I would never have let him know. People have to behave professionally in the workplace so that everyone can be comfortable working there.

People who get uncomfortable about other people saying that they're the coolest guy/girl in the world for them, need to learn to accept a compliment with grace. Ofcourse, if people can't take the hint after you say "well, sorry, thanks for the compliment but I'm afraid the reverse isn't true." THEN you would have a case. But stating your feelings should be possible. At least for grown-ups. The state of the American public is ofcourse a subject for debate and one could argue that most American's are not grown-ups, at least not emotionally.

But what strikes me most is that venting negative emotions is apparently professional (Steven Ballmer's chair, pointy haired bosses, etc.) but showing positive emotions like appreciation and love are unprofessional. That statement speaks volumes about your (and other people's) ability to deal with emotions you cannot just ignore or shrug off.

(*) I'm kidding :)

Re:I totally agree

[Rich0]

Of course, who is to say what she actually said, but I agree - the word "love" is REALLY strong. Unless you're a teenager you shouldn't be using it to describe every little infatuation.

Relationships at work can be very messy - particularly when they involve somebody you work closely with. You need to take things carefully one step at a time.

Re:Congratulations! Now the world _knows_.

[cain]

Netflix automatically keeps track of your "favorite genres". There is a top level genre "Gay & Lesbian", not to mention a pack of sub-genres with similar names. If you found out your mother's or sister's NetFlix account had those at the top of the list, wouldn't you at least wonder? Imagine if those were your "favorite genres" and your worst enemy/boss/husband/wife saw that. Wouldn't they wonder about you? While they may not know you're gay, they would wonder...

Netflix didn't just anonymize the data

[eggspurt]

Via http://www.stat.columbia.edu/~cook/movabletype/archives/2009/12/privacy_vs_know.html:

I'm not sure whether the litigators have read this particular section of the Netflix prize rules:

To prevent certain inferences being drawn about the Netflix customer base, some of the rating data for some customers in the training and qualifying sets have been deliberately perturbed in one or more of the following ways: deleting ratings; inserting alternative ratings and dates; and modifying rating dates.

So yes, you can match a set of reviews with someone else, but how will you know that it's really a person and not a random coincidence? 0.5 million review traces give plenty of opportunity for a false positive match. Netflix learned from AOL's data release disaster, which resulted in a few people getting fired.

Re:In that I do not use NetFlix, I have some quest

[concept14]

When ordering the movies, is the order a post card type of request or a sealed envelope?

The movies are ordered online, on a plain old http: rather than https: page. So no, not a sealed envelope.