Norway to track all supermarket purchases? • Hacker News Board

Re: Norway to track all supermarket purchases?

#111

Post by fudgefactorfive » Sat, Jun 04, 2022, 3:57 PM UTC

finnh wrote: post #38

Enginerrrd wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ostensibly... But if you ever pay with a card, it's quite likely those with the data will be able to correlate your cash purchases with the card purchase and thus identify you.

How? Unless you input a form of ID (like a telephone number in a loyalty program) I don't see how a cash transaction can be linked to you at all. It's not like your cash purchase of 58.32kr has a match 578.32 kr withdrawal; that cash was taken from an ATM in a large, round-number bundle.

The point isn't explicitly connecting the cash purchase directly to you. The point is there are plenty of ways to attach payment methods directly to you and once that's happened anything else related to you can allow inference of further purchase data.

For example, store POS system tracks nearby MAC addresses (simplest to do, very archaic). You always have your phone on you. Game Over. Even if you pay cash, if you've ever paid with a bank card connected to your identity next to that phone a logical inference can be made that the cash transaction XYZ is related to pseudonymous ID ABC if phone P's identifier was present at time of purchase.

That's what the entire point of things like Google Wallet/Pay is. Another means of directly attaching payment methods to your ID. Once that bank card is connected to you all transactions for that card from any source is also connected to you. From that every ID present at time of purchase is one step removed from you.

And so it goes...

Re: Norway to track all supermarket purchases?

#112

Post by DrJokepu » Sat, Jun 04, 2022, 3:57 PM UTC

jvm___ wrote: post #90

giantg2 wrote: post #14

"SSB claims they want a less time-consuming way of collecting and analysing household consumption statistics in order to inform tax policy, social assistance and child allowance." Aka the more we know about you, the more efficiently we can create policies to control your behavior to our liking.

You're already being tracked by the grocery stores, wouldn't it be better to be tracked by someone who at least tries to have your best interests at heart vs. the grocery industry who just wants to sell you more?

It doesn’t look like this will stop supermarkets from tracking people, this will just require them to share that information with the government, so this tracking will be in addition to the existing tracking, not replacing it. I would say that’s objectively worse.

Re: Norway to track all supermarket purchases?

#113

Post by davchana » Sat, Jun 04, 2022, 3:57 PM UTC

cma wrote: post #60

throwaway4aday wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're talking about the tracking done by reward systems then that's a voluntary agreement that people enter into. You can choose not to use a rewards program. As far as I know, if you use a credit card they only know the total of how much you spent and once again you can choose not to use a credit card or bank card and pay with cash if you wish. This proposed data collection has no opt out option. It's kind of ex…

Why would the grocery store, who tracks inventory changes with each sale, only be able to know the credit card total?

OP means the "card issuing bank" knows only the total amount spent, not the individual items cost.

Re: Norway to track all supermarket purchases?

#114

Post by LadyCailin » Sat, Jun 04, 2022, 3:58 PM UTC

charlieyu1 wrote: post #37

mateo1 wrote: post #29

People seem to suddenly forget that these transactions are already tracked and individually linked to you. Should we allow anyone to collect that data except democratically elected governments? What's the logic behind this?

In most countries, paying in cash is a thing. And I try to avoid paying with cards or e-payment as much as I can

Norway is also really not a fan of cash, so they’re doing all they can to phase it out, especially during the pandemic.

Re: Norway to track all supermarket purchases?

#115

Post by somehnacct3757 » Sat, Jun 04, 2022, 3:59 PM UTC

JohnJamesRambo wrote: post #45

charlieyu1 wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In most countries, paying in cash is a thing. And I try to avoid paying with cards or e-payment as much as I can

You must have hella change laying around.

If you always carry your change with you and spend it whenever possible, your coin quantity will remain pocketable.

You gotta be committed enough to hand over a twenty dollar bill alongside a quarter, when paying a $19.17 bill for example. Rather than take in 83 cents you take in 8 (and score a dollar.)

Re: Norway to track all supermarket purchases?

#116

Post by DeathArrow » Sat, Jun 04, 2022, 3:59 PM UTC

jvm___ wrote: post #90

giantg2 wrote: post #14

"SSB claims they want a less time-consuming way of collecting and analysing household consumption statistics in order to inform tax policy, social assistance and child allowance." Aka the more we know about you, the more efficiently we can create policies to control your behavior to our liking.

You're already being tracked by the grocery stores, wouldn't it be better to be tracked by someone who at least tries to have your best interests at heart vs. the grocery industry who just wants to sell you more?

Now you are tracked by both private entities and the state.

I don't want to be tracked by anyone, without my explicit consent, which I should be able to withdraw anytime.

Re: Norway to track all supermarket purchases?

#117

Post by rhn_mk1 » Sat, Jun 04, 2022, 3:59 PM UTC

forgot_user1234 wrote: post #105

NAV is an Extremely well run org. I believe in the system and I believe Norwegian state will do the right thing Case in point - look at the tech platform docs for NAVs tech teams - https://nais.io/

That's a reasonable stance as long as you believe that no change will ever happen. Neither peaceful change from within, nor violent from outside.

Re: Norway to track all supermarket purchases?

#118

Post by jacooper » Sat, Jun 04, 2022, 3:59 PM UTC

basisword wrote: post #91

paulcole wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Doing stuff like this today is going to be 100x better than what people 3 generations from now will have to live through thanks to climate change. The question is whether we’re willing to inconvenience ourselves today to protect future generations - and the answer is looking like no.

The answer is no for stupid solutions like tracking everybody’s meat consumption and a government limiting it. You will be swiftly told to fuck off (and rightly so). You need to get people on your side and contributing without massively changing their lifestyles, instead of alienating them. We need massive reductions in business contributions to climate change and we need investment in current clean energy solutions…

Exactly, I don't know why we are focusing on meat while we all know that energy and business emissions are more important, it looks like its an intentional distraction from big oil, and to give Norway's government more spying powers.

Re: Norway to track all supermarket purchases?

#119

Post by LadyCailin » Sat, Jun 04, 2022, 3:59 PM UTC

rhn_mk1 wrote: post #110

mateo1 wrote: post #29

People seem to suddenly forget that these transactions are already tracked and individually linked to you. Should we allow anyone to collect that data except democratically elected governments? What's the logic behind this?

Thankfully, you're wrong - cash still exists.

For now, but not much longer in Norway, if the various governmental players get their way.

Re: Norway to track all supermarket purchases?

#120

Post by fullshark » Sat, Jun 04, 2022, 4:00 PM UTC

ekianjo wrote: post #79

867-5309 wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

this would arguably be a great thing

Let's not stop there and let's profile people on everything they purchase and increase their taxes on everything that's not remotely considered healthy enough, because you know, they increase the burden on the whole society! That's the recipe for the abolition of individual freedom.

You can choose to pay more taxes/fees at least, people already do that for certain things that are designed to nudge people to behave properly (e.g. pay 10 cents for a bag to encourage you to bring reusable bags and some people just don't care). Sin taxes are not new things.