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Data Broker Medbase200 Sold Lists of Rape & Domestic Violence Victims
McGruber writes "During her testimony (PDF) at a Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation hearing Wednesday about the data-broker industry, Pam Dixon, executive director of the World Privacy Forum, revealed that the Medbase200 unit of Integrated Business Services Incorporated had been offering a list of 'rape sufferers' on its website, at a cost of $79 for 1,000 names. The company, which sells marketing information to pharmaceutical companies, also offered lists of domestic violence victims, HIV/AIDS patients, and 'peer pressure sufferers.' In an interview with the Wall Street Journal, Integrated Business Services Incorporated President Sam Tartamella initially denied that his company maintained or sold databases of rape victims. After the Journal provided him a link to the 'rape sufferers' page, he said he would remove it from Medbase200's website and denied ever having sold such a list. The page was removed later Wednesday."
The SEC database 'EDGAR' lists corporations, and required information are the names and contact information for corporate officers.....
Just so you know that THEIR names are on lists, too.....
You don't need to know this information and you especially don't need to know this information in aggregate.
wow.
I think I'm starting a business which will sell data on the 1% to anyone who wants it. It's time to even the odds.
If telephones are outlawed, then only outlaws will have telephones.
Medbase200 unit of Integrated Business Services Incorporated had been offering a list of 'rape sufferers' on its website, at a cost of $79 for 1,000 names. The company, which sells marketing information to pharmaceutical companies, also offered lists of domestic violence victims, HIV/AIDS patients, and 'peer pressure sufferers.'
Well, I don't know about the rest of you, but I'm going ahead and putting in my application with Uncle Enzo's CosaNostra Pizza Corporation...
An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
How is this even possible with the entire medical privacy laws. I understand data might be important to further medical science but shouldn't it be sanitized of identifying information? And if it is not, then shouldn't the patients being exposed be compensated for this use? It is not like something so heavily regulated like medical industry can offer real choices for alternatives. I've seen counties deny hospitals planned on being built just so the one already in place could expand right after they fought tooth and nail to stop the competition.
It's complete BS if you ask me.
As if these poor peoples' lives weren't already shitty enough.
Now we have a bunch of marketeer ass-hats singling them out as unique business opportunities.
Yet again, making me wish I owned a gun, yet glad I don't, since I'd shoot these motherfuckers in a heartbeat.
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
You have to expect this, when the only legal and moral duty that directors and managers of their companies are to look after their shareholders. And even then, the shareholders get raped by the boss class.
As a society, we reap what we sow, when we let them get sufficiently powerful, that they can simply buy favourable laws and regulations and tell the world to get fucked.
This will be the undoing of Western civilisation -- our inability to contain the power of a feral, out-of-control overclass.
with, "if you've nothing to hide," I hope this will make you consider how much privacy has to do with simple human dignity.
She said they would remove the listing from their website. She did not say she would stop selling or even destroy such a list.
The question is never "Will they?". The question is always, "Can they?" And more to the point.. "Can they and still get away with it profitably?" So when you are puzzling over some abhorrent possibility, run it through that filter and you will invariably find your answer.
isn't the 'boss class' to blame? Seriously, Western Civilization really does seem to revel in self flagellation. Like a rape victim blaming themselves, which is weirdly appropriate (ironic? I can't remember the actual meaning of that word though... )
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Yet again, making me wish I owned a gun, yet glad I don't, since I'd shoot these motherfuckers in a heartbeat.
79 bucks gets you a gun catalog and a list of these Mofos.
Set your phasers on "funky"!
Who are the "they" that are selling the list. Let's see names, addresses, phone numbers, family member names, etc..
Let's just make sure he gets added to the list, then see how he feels about the subject!
There are forces at work beyond my ken.
Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.
Ernest Hemingway
"Front of the line." Luther Laurence, "The Given Day"
Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.
Ernest Hemingway
Gotta give me more than that. I googled it, found the book, but I don't get the reference (cannot sift through the whole book, sir).
Politics; n. : A religion whereby man is god.
(cannot sift through the whole book, sir).
Ah, but you could.
Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.
Ernest Hemingway
me
filler here, filler there etc. slashdot bitcoin etc.
That's a victimization term now? So 99.999% of the entire global population over the age of 3 are now classified as a victim.
--- Keep the choice with the user..
They claim that the list was a fake list used for testing, but even that suggests something wrong. Surely test data should be more harmless and fanciful to make sure it doesn't go live. A disease like monday blues or foot-in-mouth disease would be a better choice, surely.
In Europe this data would definitly qualify as Private Personal data for data protection, these people need to launch a million dollar legal action for this compared to too hot coffee.