How To Protect Your Privacy and Make Money

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How To Protect Your Privacy and Make Money

Posted by CmdrTaco on Tuesday March 1, 2011 @11:18AM from the pardon-my-skepticism dept.

itwbennett writes "You have precious personal information; marketers are willing to pay good money for it; and now there are services to broker the deal. London-based Allow Ltd., for example, negotiates with marketers on your behalf and cuts you in on the deal. One Allow customer, Giles Sequeira, made a whopping $10 for letting a single credit card company know that he's in the market for new plastic. In the US, a company called Personal is starting a similar pay-for-data service, and you can hop on its waiting list now." Anyone selling bridges?

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Posting anonymous so that... by Anonymous Coward · 2011-03-01 11:23 · Score: 2, Funny

Posting anonymous so that... Bots can't dig my posting habits!!
Protect Your Privacy by iYk6 · 2011-03-01 11:23 · Score: 4, Insightful

How does this protect your privacy? It sounds more like selling your privacy.
1. Re:Protect Your Privacy by alvinrod · 2011-03-01 11:32 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  It doesn't, but if you're personal information is going to be whored out anyway, you might as well at least be the one pimping it.
2. Re:Protect Your Privacy by hedwards · 2011-03-01 12:06 · Score: 3, Funny
  
  Yo, got your 16 digits right here, they're barely legal and ready to do naughty things for cash.
3. Re:Protect Your Privacy by causality · 2011-03-01 12:43 · Score: 5, Insightful
  
  When you visit somebodies web server, the information regarding that visit is not your personal property. If you don't want them to record and mine your activities on their website, don't visit that website. Get noscript and live on the internet that way
  
  Thats like walking into a 7/11 and bitching because they're recording you without asking. Its like getting on public transit and bitching at the driver because there are passenger counters installed. Its like going to your local politician up in arms about the traffic counter installed on the road you take home. Frankly, I have no idea what personal data is supposed to mean in this context. You're visiting somebody else's domain. How is a record of that and what you do there, belong to you in any way shape or form?
  It would be courteous of you to learn what browser tracking is, how it is performed, and what sorts of data can be gathered before deciding to speak about the subject. That would save me some time and Slashdot some bandwidth.
  That the owner of a particular site knows my IP address visited that specific site is not the problem. In short, the problem is that there are multiple ways in which an organization can track your browsing across many different sites that said organization does not own.
  This is not like complaining that the local 7/11 recorded my visit. This is more like the local 7/11 hiring someone to follow me around and record every store I visit.
  Now that the very most basic bit of knowledge about this subject has been spoonfed to you, perhaps you could revise your position in light of this new information.
  
  --
  It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education. - Einstein
4. Re:Protect Your Privacy by Kilrah_il · 2011-03-01 23:23 · Score: 2
  
  Although you took care to attack your parent's knowledge of computer basics, he does have a point you did not address: The only information captured automatically about me is that IP X visited the site. The rest of the info is stuff I gave them voluntarily (my name, etc.). After that, the sites just cooperate (either directly or through a third party) to aggregate all the instances of IP X visiting their site. It is not like 7/11 hiring somebody to follow me, but more like 7/11 talking with WalMart and any other shop in the area and asking them if I went there. You may not like this, but your privacy was not invaded. The details of your public appearance was shared among different entities.
  Of course, if they share private details (name, CC, gender, whether or not you like bondage [/joke, no trolling], etc.) without consent in their TOS then we have a problem. Now you might say that the details of what they share are buried in a 10 page, small-fonted TOS document, but that is another discussion. We can open a new anti-legalese rant thread.
  
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  Whenever in an argument, remember this.
allow seems to offer 10 quid as a signup fee, by qwerty8ytrewq · 2011-03-01 11:23 · Score: 2

Although this does seem a bit like getting paid to donate blood, somehow good but wrong... this guy has some interesting writing on how selling your 'private' data can be a good idea.

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Waiting for the other shoe to...
Re:What an amazing offer by Auroch · 2011-03-01 11:32 · Score: 5, Informative

Considering I have never paid a late fee or interest on a credit card since college, please tell me how they do that. I always pay it off every two weeks and spend the rewards when I get X amount. How are they making money?
My real interest is because if this does make them money I will probably stop doing it. My biggest reason besides the rewards for doing this is to hurt these banks.
You mean, the fact that there is a hidden cost of using a credit card built into your daily life doesn't bother you? Of course, you don't see the price increase, the merchants build it in. Generally speaking, you can get a cash discounted price at a mom and pop store for simply paying debit or cash - because then they don't pay the CC company and the related merchant fees.

So, yeah, I guess just so long as you don't actually *see* the increased cost, it won't bother you. And for big-box stores, those prices are part-and-parcel of their merch, so abstaining from using a CC may not help you there ... but if you're okay promoting the practice, then keep on plastic-ing.

--
Quartz Extreme and Core Image. Are there any other real reasons to spend all that money on generic hardware?
Re:What an amazing offer by igreaterthanu · 2011-03-01 11:35 · Score: 2

Considering I have never paid a late fee or interest on a credit card since college
You are paying the extra 3 or so percent that all the merchants increase their prices by to pay for the credit card fees. Now the fees go to the company who paid you the $10. At 3% and $10, they only need you to spend $334 before they make money on the deal.

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I dream of a nation where a man is not judged by his skin color but by an number assigned by a credit rating agency.
Selling your data by makubesu · 2011-03-01 11:40 · Score: 2

is way less profitable than selling your body.
Re:What an amazing offer by Faux_Pseudo · 2011-03-01 12:23 · Score: 2

The rewards don't hurt the banks. They hurt the merchants you redeem them at. They are the ones that take the hit, not the card company/bank.

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Ascii artist &
Can I sell YOUR information? by nghate · 2011-03-01 12:38 · Score: 2

I wonder how long before ID theft get's applied to make money this way...
Re:What an amazing offer by h4rr4r · 2011-03-01 13:35 · Score: 2

CC costs me nothing, I pay it every 2 weeks. CC companies hire people, give me cash back and a free loan. What does the game store do that compares?
What line of credit provides cash back?
Re:What an amazing offer by joocemann · 2011-03-01 13:52 · Score: 2

Gotta be pretty naive to not see the benefits of small local businesses.
Re:Wimp. by Nikker · 2011-03-01 16:17 · Score: 3, Funny

$1000, the check is being mailed to the above address as we speak. Thank you and have a good day.

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A loop, by its nature, continues. If that didn't make sense, start reading this sentence again.