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Google’s new program to track shoppers sparks a federal privacy complaint

washingtonpost.com

41–50 of 135 posts

Re: Google’s new program to track shoppers sparks a federal privacy complaint

#41
post #15
post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you want it to be sold to your insurance company? We see that you're a regular coffee drinker which is correlated with increased risk of heart problems -- here's a rate increase.

Maybe we'll get universal healthcare at some point and people will stop rolling out this tired argument.

I live in Canada. Still applies. Just replace health insurance with life insurance, car insurance, or home insurance.

Re: Google’s new program to track shoppers sparks a federal privacy complaint

#42
post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or potentially worse, if they're compromised/hacked in some way and that data simply enters the wild ecosystem.

I still can't see why I should care if some stranger has my purchase history. I suppose some people might feel weird letting strangers or anyone know what they buy, but that's an argument for the ability to opt-out, not for filing a complaint with an agency or starting a lawsuit.

I'm certainly not as clever as most thieves but if you had a database of people's purchases I imagine there's some low hanging fruit if you run a query looking for people purchasing lots of valuables, with no security related purchases, and a consistent pattern of taking a vacation out of state every year.

Re: Google’s new program to track shoppers sparks a federal privacy complaint

#43
post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

AFAICT, interest rates are too low (near zero) for banks to make a profit on interest margins alone. You could have a non-profit do the interchange, like the Interac network in Canada, but that would be difficult to coordinate without consolidating all the banks. (Canada has, like, only half a dozen.)

Actually this is solved in the eurozone with that payment method, name forgotten... It is a fundamental bit of what the Euro is about being able to transfer money without the fees.

>> name forgotten

SEPA?

Re: Google’s new program to track shoppers sparks a federal privacy complaint

#44
post #4

Unfortunately, credit card companies/banks/etc have been selling purchasing histories, to pretty much all comers, for years. It'd be really nice if we could stop that instead of caring about the particular people they sell it to. IE It's not "better" when they sell it to someone who isn't Google, and I honestly could't give a crap about the complaint, which mostly deals with antitrust.

>> IE It's not "better" when they sell it to someone who isn't Google

It's better in the sense that those companies can probably do much less with purchase histories than Google as they have less total information on me (whereas Google has email, web history, photos, etc. if I allow them).

Re: Google’s new program to track shoppers sparks a federal privacy complaint

#45
post #36

> Google called its advertising approach "common" Tragedy of the commons. At this point in time, any and all forms of data collection have become common. When I visit a website, I expect them to collect everything about me - my IP, my mouse movements, what I clicked, how long I took to click it. Just a matter of time, that they start tracking audio and visual cues as well. It's unthinkable today but we will get there…

start tracking audio and visual cues as well Do you mean microphone and camera, or something else? (If you do mean mic/camera, sites can't access those without prompting the browser to show a permissions dialog and you clicking "ok".)

How fortunate, then, that browsers never have security bugs.

Re: Google’s new program to track shoppers sparks a federal privacy complaint

#46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I still can't see why I should care if some stranger has my purchase history. I suppose some people might feel weird letting strangers or anyone know what they buy, but that's an argument for the ability to opt-out, not for filing a complaint with an agency or starting a lawsuit.

There's plenty of people who get up to things that would result in severe professional damage if it became public knowledge - I know a handful of teachers who are into BDSM in their private lives who are eternally terrified of their employers or a journalist catching wind. "Some stranger" isn't necessarily the issue, it's someone who has the ability to harm you that's the issue.

Or look at the short term Mozilla CEO that was ousted over a public outcry regarding similar private matters.

Edit: Hrmf, never mind. Egg on my face.

Re: Google’s new program to track shoppers sparks a federal privacy complaint

#47
post #17
post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe we'll get universal healthcare at some point and people will stop rolling out this tired argument.

Okay, how would you like your purchase histories to be used to determine your wealth and companies charge you more for goods and services because they know you can afford to. "I'm sorry sir, our system says your wealth rating is 600, our discounts only apply to people with 400 or lower."

We already see this with how airlines alter the pricing depending on when the ticket is bought and whatsnot (because if it is bought for a middle of the week trip etc, it is likely to be a business trip).

Re: Google’s new program to track shoppers sparks a federal privacy complaint

#48
post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe we'll get universal healthcare at some point and people will stop rolling out this tired argument.

I live in Canada. Still applies. Just replace health insurance with life insurance, car insurance, or home insurance.

Indeed. Already seeing car insurance being based on age and gender. Because apparently young male drivers are more careless and aggressive in their driving style...

Re: Google’s new program to track shoppers sparks a federal privacy complaint

#49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's plenty of people who get up to things that would result in severe professional damage if it became public knowledge - I know a handful of teachers who are into BDSM in their private lives who are eternally terrified of their employers or a journalist catching wind. "Some stranger" isn't necessarily the issue, it's someone who has the ability to harm you that's the issue.

Or look at the short term Mozilla CEO that was ousted over a public outcry regarding similar private matters. Edit: Hrmf, never mind. Egg on my face.

Publicly-disclosed (by legal mandate) financial sponsorship of a public advocacy campaign on a public policy matter is about as far as you can be from a “private matter”.

Re: Google’s new program to track shoppers sparks a federal privacy complaint

#50

> To do this, Google said it had obtained access to the credit and debit card records of 70 percent of U.S. consumers. After reading the initial article in May, I called American Express and they swore up and own they don't sell my purchased data. I don't see how you get above 70% without data from American Express. So who's lying?

American Express has a pretty small market share (7.5%)

https://wallethub.com/edu/market-share-by-credit-card-networ...

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