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Many Americans not aware of being tracked with facial recognition while shopping

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Re: Many Americans not aware of being tracked with facial recognition while shopping

#271

Post by gnabgib »

meowster wrote: post #224

I would love for there to be a legal requirement/warning posted on shop entrances saying "This facility uses CCTV/Facial Tracking/Phone Tracking/etc"

There are requirements for the CCTV notices already.. you probably haven't noticed, because they're tiny and out of the way. Plus a lot of establishments use non-committal language like "may be recorded by CCTV" (almost as if every retailer added the signs but only some of them added the tech).

It would be great if this was posted, boldly, clearly. As long as there are data protection limits (only 3 month's history can be maintained, data is unrecoverably disposed of) and accommodations for those who do not consent. (If every grocery store adopts the tech, how will you buy groceries if you do not accept these practices?)

Re: Many Americans not aware of being tracked with facial recognition while shopping

#272

Post by iso1210 »

munificent wrote: post #165
reedjosh wrote: post #131

This to me is part of a general trend wherein only those with the awareness and resources required will have privacy. For example, if you do have the funds, send a private shopper. But an even more direct example is skipping the discounts associated with club cards for privacy reasons. This will further entrench the class divide between the wealthy and the rest of us.

The industrial revolution divided the world into those who had capital (owned factories, tools, land, etc.) and those who produced labor (worked in the factories, used the tools, worked the land, etc.). Those on the side of labor couldn't provide value without access to capital where it could be used. Conversely, those with capital need labor to extract value from it. The factories don't run themselves. In theory, th…

> At some point, we will hopefully have an "organized data movement" where people work together to be able to make effective demands about how their data can be harvested and used. We aren't there yet.

The GDPR comes along, and HN hated it

Re: Many Americans not aware of being tracked with facial recognition while shopping

#273

Post by oramit »

boatsie wrote: post #243
oramit wrote: post #234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, you can infer a lot based on grocery store purchases. I don't deny it - but why does it matter? What bad things have happened to the average person based on grocery store purchase history? Again, i'm not trying to be flippant with my questions I'm honestly just frustrated after decades of following privacy discussions that there isn't a clear answer to this question.

I wonder this too, but perhaps your insurance company buys this data on you and says, oh, they drink sugary drinks and eat candy and chips. They are buying Tylenol and ibuprofen for chronic pain. Maybe they will get diabetes and we should raise their premiums accordingly.

I don't mean to rag on you in particular. The answers I get around privacy problems are always conjecture. "Perhaps" the insurance company will do x, "Maybe" they will do y.

It's always some scary threat that could happen in the future. The problem is though that the powers that be (government/corporate) already have more private information than ever before and yet: nothing has happened.

At what point do these warnings just become crying wolf?

Re: Many Americans not aware of being tracked with facial recognition while shopping

#274

Post by legerdemain »

hamburgerwah wrote: post #269

One other thing people may not realize. If you use your credit card at a merchant online or in person and you associate any information such as a telephone number or email with that card. Any time you use that card, online or off, to make a purchase with that merchant those transactions can be tied together regardless of whether you provide your email/phone on future transactions. Large vendors such as walmart etc no…

Then why does it take the sales person at Macy's 15 minutes to look up my order before giving up and just giving me a refund for a poorly fitting sweater I brought back?

Re: Many Americans not aware of being tracked with facial recognition while shopping

#275

Post by unstatedAnswers »

legerdemain wrote: post #274
hamburgerwah wrote: post #269

One other thing people may not realize. If you use your credit card at a merchant online or in person and you associate any information such as a telephone number or email with that card. Any time you use that card, online or off, to make a purchase with that merchant those transactions can be tied together regardless of whether you provide your email/phone on future transactions. Large vendors such as walmart etc no…

Then why does it take the sales person at Macy's 15 minutes to look up my order before giving up and just giving me a refund for a poorly fitting sweater I brought back?

Customer support is a cost center, so it gets less funding than sales/marketing-oriented projects

(route-optimizing here likely has the intention of boosting sales, not necessarily reducing customer shopping time)

Re: Many Americans not aware of being tracked with facial recognition while shopping

#276

Post by unstatedAnswers »

reedjosh wrote: post #131

This to me is part of a general trend wherein only those with the awareness and resources required will have privacy. For example, if you do have the funds, send a private shopper. But an even more direct example is skipping the discounts associated with club cards for privacy reasons. This will further entrench the class divide between the wealthy and the rest of us.

Then your private shopper gets tracked. It’s just a pointer to your actual self, like how a “ghost account” gets created on Facebook or Google, when you browse in incognito

Re: Many Americans not aware of being tracked with facial recognition while shopping

#277

Post by 1MachineElf »

legerdemain wrote: post #274
hamburgerwah wrote: post #269

One other thing people may not realize. If you use your credit card at a merchant online or in person and you associate any information such as a telephone number or email with that card. Any time you use that card, online or off, to make a purchase with that merchant those transactions can be tied together regardless of whether you provide your email/phone on future transactions. Large vendors such as walmart etc no…

Then why does it take the sales person at Macy's 15 minutes to look up my order before giving up and just giving me a refund for a poorly fitting sweater I brought back?

For Macy's, the 15 minutes you were forced to spend inside the store is a feature, not a bug.

Re: Many Americans not aware of being tracked with facial recognition while shopping

#278

Post by dellcybpwr »

hamburgerwah wrote: post #269

One other thing people may not realize. If you use your credit card at a merchant online or in person and you associate any information such as a telephone number or email with that card. Any time you use that card, online or off, to make a purchase with that merchant those transactions can be tied together regardless of whether you provide your email/phone on future transactions. Large vendors such as walmart etc no…

okay... i'll bite: how does one use a card online without providing phone or email?

Re: Many Americans not aware of being tracked with facial recognition while shopping

#279

Post by oramit »

JohnFen wrote: post #213
oramit wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why should I care to keep what I buy at the grocery store private? I'm not trying to be flippant with this question. I'm just honestly perplexed why this is an important dateset to keep private. Also, why would I want to avoid discounts? Grocery stores are one of the few places that gives me money for handing them my data. Isn't this good behavior!?

Purchasing history is some of the most personal and sensitive data there is about you. It can reveal nearly everything. But, ignoring that, there's a very good reason why you might want to keep as much data out of the machine as possible -- even data that, on its own, is of no importance. That reason is databases. The data you provide to any business will be combined with the data you've provided everywhere else. All…

Yes, all these disparate databases can be merged together and you can get a pretty darn accurate picture of me.

But so what, what is the end game here?

Re: Many Americans not aware of being tracked with facial recognition while shopping

#280

Post by ruined »

dellcybpwr wrote: post #278
hamburgerwah wrote: post #269

One other thing people may not realize. If you use your credit card at a merchant online or in person and you associate any information such as a telephone number or email with that card. Any time you use that card, online or off, to make a purchase with that merchant those transactions can be tied together regardless of whether you provide your email/phone on future transactions. Large vendors such as walmart etc no…

okay... i'll bite: how does one use a card online without providing phone or email?

you can't
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