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Concert Ticket Retailer AXS Collects Personally Identifiable Data Through Its App, Which is Mandatory To Download, and Sells It To 3rd Party Without Anonymizing (theoutline.com)
AXS, a digital marketplace operated by Anschutz Entertainment Group (AEG), is the second largest presenter of live events in the world after Live Nation Entertainment (i.e. Ticketmaster). Paris Martineau of The Outline reports that the company forces customers to download a predatory app which goes on to snatch up a range of personally identifiable data and sells it to a range of companies, including Facebook and Google, without ever anonymizing or aggregating them. From the report: The company requires users to download an app to use any ticket for a concert, game, or show bought through AXS, and it doesn't come cheap. AXS uses a system called Flash Seats, which relies on a dynamically generated barcode system (read: screenshotting doesn't work) to fight off ticket scalping and reselling. [...] Here's a brief overview of all of the information that can be collected from just the mobile app alone, nearly all of which is shared with third parties without being anonymized or aggregated: first and last name, precise location (as determined by GPS, WiFi, and other means), how often the app is used, what content is viewed using the app, which ads are clicked, what purchases are made (and not made), a user's personal advertising identifier, IP address, operating system, device make and model, billing address, credit card number, security code, mailing address, phone number, and email address, among many others. [...] AXS also shares the personal data collected on its customers with event promoters and other clients, none of whom are bound even by this (extremely lax) privacy policy.
Name, credit card #, CVN, and EXP? Can't wait till they're on the hook for a massive credit card fraud spree -- should be fun to watch them get sued into bankruptcy.
It's long past time to regulate this data collection worldwide and put a stop to this "wild west" of privacy invasion. It's absolutely sickening.
Who the hell would download an app to buy a ticket?
A technological fix that turns out to be much worse than the ailment.
Go progress!
Companies hate reselling tickets because it blows holes in the demand/price relationship. You can see that for some events the tickets are priced much too high. For instance baseball tickets when resold can go for as low as $5 (or aren't sold at all), because the demand really isn't there.
Try reading the actual article. I couldn't muster the entire thing because the amount of asinine bullshit in it. It really reads as through the guy just read through the TOS for AXS app, and didn't understand half of it, and so made false conclusions based on piecing unrelated parts together.
Can the app collect your credit card number? Of course, it is a commerce app for purchasing tickets.
Can the app share information to Facebook? Of course, what app DOESNT have a "SHARE THAT I'M AT THIS CONCERT RIGHT NOW" feature.
Are these two features directly linked? Of fucking course not. But both exist in the same TOS, therefor the article writer is making false conclusions based on their own idiotic click-baitery sensationalistic bullshit.
Is that app available in the EU, too?
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
I don't buy tickets for concerts anymore. Ticket companies are to blame. I'll buy from Bandcamp.
GDPR
It's because of stuff like this that the GDPR was put in place in the EU. The rest of the world really should follow suit.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wik...
I recently went to a show, and while many people used apps to show bar codes, printed version that I presented worked just as well.
I've used ASX plenty of times to buy concert tickets and the app is not mandatory. I don't have it installed on my phone. All you need is the credit card used to purchase the tickets to present at the venue. As far as selling my info goes, well that's a different matter.
Wow
Wikipedia page is here. He's a Christian conservative, worth over $12B, and owns a multitude of businesses in a variety of different industries.
Makes me want to get a flip phone and order a ticket.
Not a chicken, they'll parrot the usual excuses and nobody in management is touched. Possibly a cost of doing business fine, less than the cost of doing security properly
Any business that requires a smart phone app doesn't get my business. Not entirely for myself, but because not everyone has or can afford a smart phone. There should be alternative ways to buy things or secure coupons. Also, it's best to keep your personal communications device free of vendor apps, they are just scraping your phone and require too many permisions. Use an old/cheap wifi only phone with a junk gmail account that lacks your contacts and private info if you really have to do that. Same damn problem as a thousand loyalty cards, just a pita.
Several years ago, we were talking about Gracenote's metadata, it came up that your musical tastes are a shockingly accurate predictor of your political leanings.
So consider that this metadata just helped all those "partners" build an even more accurate profile of you.
Lesson learned? Don't use apps.
WTF is it with these goddamn paragraph-sized article titles? The novel-sized summaries are bad enough as it is. I truly miss the old slashdot.
This is just one more reason I rarely install apps on my phone.
It seems as if most apps do suspicious shit in the background, and/or harvest your data, display ads, drain your battery, etc etc etc.
I mean seriously- why does a flashlight app need access to my contacts or my location information?
Just cruising through this digital world at 33 1/3 rpm...