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Profiling A Nation
Publishing and Broadcasting Ltd, Australia's biggest media company and allied to Microsoft, has teamed with IT services company, Acxiom, to create that country's biggest private data repository, according to this story. It will hold the cross-matched details of Australia's 20 million people culled from government electoral rolls, Microsoft-related Web sites including Hotmail and Passport, credit card reports, casino records, bank statements and a variety of undisclosed other sources to provide marketing profiles of the country's entire population. The plan is then to sell these to marketers, insurers, banks and others. Naturally, consumer advocates and privacy groups are wary. A similar Government-sponsored scheme, the Australia Card, was universally rejected by citizens more than ten years ago. Australians are generally not protected by any privacy laws.
What do you think: is it ok for private enterprise to hold such detailed information on our private lives, offering these to the highest bidder? Is privacy dead?
How can Australia blow the whistle on Echelon, and then turn around and pull a stunt like this?
In the US, Europe and Australia we are seeing the same kinds of stories over and over again. Governments are seeking to restrict our freedom and invade our privacy. Corporations are increasingly enabled by absence of legislation or the introduction of new legislation to do the same, through unauthorised collection of private information and through aggressive pursual of intellectual property rights.
As thongs stand, parliametary democracies as in the UK, US and Australia allow governments with a strong majority (achieved through electoral processes which favour the powerful) and individual lobby groups to ride roughshod over our rights and freedoms.
It's high time that we got ourselves some government that serves the interests of the people.
We need to establish a new kind of democracy that removes the ability of corporations to buy political favours, that forces governments to listen to their electorate and to act in the way we tell them to.
In my opinion we have in the internet a very useful tool via which to organise ourselves politically. But our governments want to control that too by censorship, by outlawing the private use of encryption, and by continually snooping on our conversations with the likes of Echelon and upcoming advances in AI-directed intelligent listening.
The window of opportunity is closing rapidly. If we don't get our act together soon, it will no longer be possible to change anything.
If you want your children to be free, then we must all campaign, demonstrate, orchestrate petitions, write to our MPs or Congressmen, boycott goods produced by corporations, make our voices heard.
Ranting about it on slashdot is just preaching to the converted.
Consciousness is not what it thinks it is
Thought exists only as an abstraction
Being an australian, i think i know a bit about the australian psyche. Usually we are a pretty good bunch (not to be making a too sweeping generalisation), but compared to what we see of america i think we do ok. Our legal system is fair, and alot of the time i think our attitude comes down to 'she'll be right, mate'. /. for bringing to the attention of the world how behind we can be with some issues. But unfortunately, our easy attitude prevails with ppl never really getting off their ass to do something, unless they are threatened with a pay cut.
This makes day to day living kinda cool, but the flip side being that when something important comes along, we do little to stop it. Just a few weeks ago we had a national refferendum to see if we wanted to become a republic. The history of past refferenda guided the outcome of this one, a 'No' vote -- a sad day for me personally. What im trying to say is that there is a general apathy here which is amplified when it comes to 'technical' issues, look at the work of Richard Alston (a federal senator) who is passing all that crap trying to ban porn on the internet..
At this stage i would like to thank
Here i go, i make a call to ppl to do something. I dont know what, but do something. Help us.
:wq ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
I think this is fair if a consumer has the right to see everything in the database under his name and delete it if he so wishes.
Lord knows I would.
Imagine life in the future where there is a single huge repository of all marketing information on every single person in the entire world. Imagine what a different life experience people would have if they opted out of that particular database compared to those who choose to stay in? The person in the database would have every single piece of advertising directed specifically to him (remember this is the future) whereas the person who opted out would get the very basic stuff, maybe nothing if such a thing was a rarity (one can dream). Imagine the social implications! Would people in the "advertising club" look down apon those who are not because they are not part of "society"? Weird thoughts I just had.
I think the worse thing would be if people were not given the opportunity to opt-out of databases such as these. I don't like people being able to find out what type of ice cream I like or the last time I bought a newspaper. I have an inherent distrust of all marketing people and car salesmen.
I wear pants.
Your card reader is part of the problem.
It is so easy to create a system that stores the data of which rooms you are in, and for how long, based on the info given by your little card, that the big companies could do it just for the heck of doing it.
Think of how easy it is to set a cookie on someones machine when they enter your site and track their progress around your website, just for the heck of it.
Now comes some big people trying to do this on a national scale, and trying to make money at it as well. The information is disturbingly lacking in privacy, but has no individuality. The information is just numbers that relate to a specific person, there is no space or time for little hand-written notes on each person.
They may be taking the privacy, but there are only two main downfalls because of this:
The first is that mass amounts of spam this will generate. If anyone can buy a list of an entire country's buying habits, instant junk mail mania.
Second is the ethical blow. Why is the government willing to set this up? Are they that desperate for money? Who is the tard who passed this all the way through so that it has gotten this far? This is the start of a bad trend.
Bah.
Is this more Microsoft bashing? The story mentions "Although relatively unknown in Australia, Acxiom is a $US2.5 billion company with more than 450 corporate clients, including IBM, American Express, Wal-Mart and AT&T."
/. knee-jerk Anti-MS stuff?
Microsoft is not mentioned ANYWHERE in the story. Where is the MS connection, or is this a standard
This pertains to Americans, since I don't have much experience elsewhere.
...Linux!
Privacy has been dead for a long long time. We don't really care, though many of us still spout off about the degredation of privary. Any discussion or demands for privacy in this country are purely academic. The issue as killed and buried by Corporate America long ago. All America cares about is making a buck. This is not limited to Corporations. We are a capitalist nation, everything we do is, almost by definition, for profit. The US economy is raging right now. One indicator I use of the the US economy is the cars we drive. In the 90's, especially the late 90's, the car have gotten bigger and bigger, and they eat more and more gas. The same thing happened in the swinging post WWII economy. We don't care about privary either. Telemarketing companies buy and sell personal information between themselves and others. All in the name of profit. I use a piece of plastic for almost every purchase I make; allowing my bank to know what I spend and where. Grocery stores offer club cards; in exchange for good deals, you give up some privacy. They can keep track of your purchase history. Why do we trade our privacy for a buck? Because Americans, for the most part, do not value privacy. The economy is good, our personal profits are high, so we really don't give a damn as long as we can keep filling up the 42 gallon tank of your suburbans with $1.50 gasoline that craps up the air we breath.
If we really care about privacy, there needs to be cultural change in our view of the value of privacy. This won't happen until after our privacy is exploited to the point of hurting people. When the sale of personal information prevents people from getting jobs, inssurance, food, etc. we may start to value it more. But because our privacy was sold at aution years ago, it's going to be an uphill battle to get it back.
Frankly, I don't want it back now. I'm the first the admit that I'm a raging capitalist. I'm willing to sell my privacy for profit, I carry a grocery store club card. I don't care if online bookstore know what I purchase and read. It makes my life a little more comfortable.
Andrew
--
"You never know when some crazed rodent with cold feet might be running loose in your pants."
-Calvin
If privacy isn't dead now, it will be very shortly.
I used to work for a company that developed medical records software, and we were approached by the Ministry of Health for Ontario, Canada. They were looking for software to put a system in place whereby all doctors in Ontario would store their patient's incredibly private information in a central location. (Our software was not designed for this purpose, but they were interested in it because of its great front-end.)
I was part of the team that trained the civil servants on the use of the software, so that they could judge its quality. After several days working together, our two groups were getting kind of chummy, so I ventured a thought towards the government's project leader. I made the suggestion that a double-blind system could be set-up, so that aggregate information about efficacy of treatments, etc., could be compiled without anyone being able to pinpoint exactly which citizen had AIDS, etc. In response, all I got was a cold, blank stare. It was obvious to me that what this government project was after was the ability to track individuals. All noble talk about creating an incredible research tool was just to make the project more palatable.
In Canada, any bank transaction valued over $1000 is tracked by the Mounties. I believe a similar law is in place in the U.S. for the FBI. These things are both pre-internet.
I'm afraid that there are no death bells tolling, since privacy died a long time ago. I'm also afraid that there is no technological solution--even PGP cannot help. The only good solution would be to have privacy solidly entrenched in law. That's definitely a long-shot, because here in Canada, with Trudeau's iteration of our constitution, the right to private property was removed. (It was a suggestion of the socialist leader of the time, Ed Broadbent, who feared a constitutional challenge to our extortionately high income taxes, which could probably be proven to be un-constitutional.)
And I don't think any Americans should believe that they have it much better, since in many states Driver's Licences can be revoked for things having nothing to do with driving, such as failing to pay child-support. I understand that in the Netherlands, according to Pulp Fiction, policeman cannot insist on searching your person. Now that's privacy law with balls! And something to strive for.
I'd even be willing to eat fries with mayo!
Mike van Lammeren
It will challenge your head, your brain, and your mind.
Someone give me $10 million, and an EMP, and I'll go take 'em out!
.AU and the one here is that the one here was totally a private operation. No goverment help, AFAIK. When the government starts asking companies to do this, and helps them, then it's time to throw a wrench into the works.
The above is a joke for the FBI afflicted!
I live roughly 10 miles away from their HQ in Conway...
The only difference between the one in
Side note:
Kinda strange to think my mom might have been one of their Database Administrators. Only problem was that she would be on call 24/7, and she would have been required to travel when asked (hmm....).
Now that governments and companies -- notably ones in Australia -- have the technology and the will to snoop on everyone and compile huge databases of detail on private citizens, stop to think who is left out of this snoop-fest. Companies and governments. Why are they special? Why are they not routinely snooped on by private citizens, and each other, with all details reported to the public at large, out our use? They collect info on us for their use. Turn it around!
We cannot put the genie back in the bottle; we cannot reverse technological and social trends and restore privacy to all citizens everywhere. But we can deny privacy to the snoops! Who will watch the watchers? We can. We will, to quote AT&T. The only rational response to steady erosion of privacy is no privacy at all, and be gung-ho about it! Lobby for laws requiring full disclosure of all government and business documents! Outlaw NDAs! Get the credit reports for corporations, public and "private." Subject corporations to the death penalty (i.e., revoke their corporate status if they commit felonies).
A single standard!
Napster-to-go says "Fill and refill your compatible MP3 player", which is a lie. It's not MP3. It's WMA with DRM.
Note, that was not a Biblical reference
Michael threw a hissy-fit today about id Software sending back graphics card information and now we have this. This is a real privacy concern. The problem isn't with the information being so openly available, it's with it being so tightly controlled, not just by one organization, but by a combination organization/government body. Business/free-enterprise/commercial world is not a democracy. Once the government immerses itself in this world, some of the democratic freedoms (mostly those based on Socialist ideas) become lost as business takes over the legislative workings. This isn't lobbying we're talking about here, this is direct cooperation and the line is blurred between government and the private sector (ever see Robocop?). I don't mind businesses collecting data and I don't mind governments collecting data, but I mind them doing it together, because government cannot effectively regulate when it is part of the process (we see that too much now already).
Slashdot readers who posted over 600 comments today about video card information should open their eyes to this real problem. Whether or not the situation is exactly as it is presented here, someone (not just me) should get on the horn to consumer rights advocates right now and make sure that the world's largest conflict of interest doesn't become a reality.
but this is nothing like the info we can get in America. Trust me, it's easy. If anyone wants to submit an address I can tell you all sorts of generalities about you and the people you live with. With a few list appends I can find your phone number, car you drive, annual income, marital status, etc. etc. etc. All of this information is out there and for sale (Mostly from credit companies, they keep *very* up to date records). The company I work for buys it all the time. We do marketing. We figure out the right audience and reach them. It's rather scientific actually.
There really isn't that much to fear. There is a margin of error that will always exists. If you try hard enough you can reach it. Most list companies (as we call them) are receptive to individual requesting removal, there aren't that many. You need to realize (as much as many of you hate it) that marketing makes markets more efficient, and the U.S. (and it looks like Aussieland too) use free-market economies. This information, en masse, is worth money and so a market develops. There are limits to the information available, but nothing that couldn't be obtained from a decent private eye, to help put it in perspective.
+&x
The main section that I can remember (since AustLII doesn't appear to be up at the moment) is that you have the right to review any information held on you and ask for it to be corrected if wrong.
I am not overly concerned by people attempting to do targeted marketing or to have a profile of me to make my customer experience more worthwhile, provided it is for a specific company. For example, I like having account records for the phone company so that they can suggets I change to a different mobile phone charging plan to save me money. It's a lot like having the waiters/waitresses at my local Italian restaurant knowing what I usually order. I get good service, and they get repeat business. This is good for both sides.
What I don't like is for a private company to gather information from disparate sources, throw it into a database and sell the extracted information to someone else that I may or may not have had any previous dealings with. If you check the fine print on most forms, there is a little section which says "If you sign this you agree to let us give/sell this information to a certain select few groups (eg: police)", so I have, in a roundabout sort of way, given my permissions to have this information gathered. of course, not signing the form denies me the services of that company, which is akin to blackmail in my mind.
What is more concerning is that with the speed of SMP computing and some rather funky algorithms it is possible to glean a great deal of information from trend analysis and similar techniques. This is information that you have not explicitly provided, but which has been deduced from your spending habits, amount of insurance, type of car, marital status, credit rating, etc.
Now I'm sure most of the uses for this information will be benign (if annoying) things like directed advertising, because the majority of people aren't interesting enough to be subjected to the wild schemes others here have concocted. A few will be though, and reality is often stranger than fiction. I don't want to be the guinea pig for one of those schemes. I want the opportunity to opt out, which should be my right as a consumer. Others may not be bothered by this company's motives. Fine. Let them remain in the database. I want out though.
If I am not given that option, then I may need to start taking subversive (yet amusing) action. A few random thoughts (please comment if you really are a lawyer):
Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they're NOT after you.
http://www.cnn.com/US/9 911/29/internet.murder.ap/index.html
The killer used online research agencies to find out information about his target. The killer even advises: "It's actually obsene (sic) what you can find out about people on the Internet".
Take his advice: refuse this gross invasion of privacy.
About 10 years ago, I created an "artificial" family. A wife, two kids, hobbies, etc... all fictional. I based it on my roommates in college at the time.
I use this fictional family whenever anyone asks for personal information. Warranty cards, whatever, I fill it all out.
A few years ago, my brother, who works for one of the major credit card companies, was testing out a new consumer database that someone was trying to sell them. The vendor was bragging about how accurate the database was, that it was based on the most current public information, etc... So how do you test something like that? Feed in family members, of course.
So my brother calls me and says "Todd, why does this database show that you have a wife and two kids?" 8-)
I agree with the sentiments voiced so far:
- currently, it's an easy system to jam
- you probably volunteered the information in the first place
- i'd rather see an "opt-in only" law rather than any form of serious government regulation. If I want to trade my privacy for convenience, that's my right! In the words of the Dead Kennedy's, Give Me Convenience or Give Me Death!
-Twid
- "When you want something with all your heart, the entire universe conspires to give it to you" -Paulo Coelho
Ever since that slashdot article on cookies in ad banners (I recommend reading it if you haven't already -- it is here: http://slashdot.org/yro/99/10/22/0249212.shtml) I've been thinking of ways to make it hard to track me via cookies. I'd like to automate something so I wouldn't have to do it by hand. What I do currently is edit ~/.netscape/cookies in emacs while browsing, and randomly change things. I set any dates I see to be right after Y2K, to help them in their testing, and transpose blocks of letters.
(Another post below observed how much of the information mined is wrong -- titles and address wrong, for instance. I always give a mangled address to the Radio Shack people who insist on asking for it when you make a purchase. I know someone who was called for a political poll, and instinctively lied to say he was supporting the underdog, figuring it was in his interest to see the front-runner campaign a little harder. I think it is in our interest to lie as much as possible to these sorts of people. Hey, I just convinced myself to go to the local grocery store and sign up for some fake discount cards.)
But anyway, back to cookie-diddling. What I want to do is write a shell script wrapper that spawns of netscape and a second process, which watches the cookie file and does the following sorts of things:
-- I want it to keep a number (say, fifty) New York Times account passwords and usernames. As I browse the nytimes.com, it should switch them in and out at random from the cookie file. This way, nytimes.com sees a number of users making random deep requests into the site, and cannot track the series of articles I read. It should be able to occasionally abandon a username password and pick up a new one automatically.
-- Play with advertiser banner ad cookies: either scramble them and let the site retrieve them, or better yet, somehow trade ad cookies back and forth with several users, thus mixing our viewing histories. The more people the better. Maybe we can set up some type of server that everyone can use.
-- Retrieve new cookies off the web that don't represent a page view, and allow them to be retrieved by the site later. It could submit a randomly choosen dictionary word to yahoo or alltheweb and crawl those links til it got some nice cookies, and toss them in the cookies file. In fact, writing a continuous low-level background task to do this all the time might be good too.
-- Finally, I want to be able to view some sort of statistics on what sites set the most cookies, how often they retrieve them, etc. Basically, the problem here is that I can't get a good idea of what information they are collecting. I can set netscape to pop the annoying little window everytime someone wants to set a cookie, but I'd like to log when they are retrieved as well. Anyone know how to track that ?
I think my last point is the most useful. While engaging a little guerilla war with data miners might be interesting for a while, what would bring real change is if the major browsers automatically kept track of them keeping track of you and allowed you to view the information in an understandable form. This might upset enough people that things would actually change -- those trusting techno-impaired out there would see this and begin to modify their buying practices.
If anyone out there has already written this sort of thing, could you please share, rather than making me re-write it ?
--Rob