It starts the moment you’re born. People start making money by selling your information. Many of these unfolding privacy concerns have been focused on Facebook in the daily headlines with the premier of “The Social Network.” But Facebook isn’t the only company feeding off of your information and it’s one of few that you’ve signed up for voluntarily. Despite how ridiculous it sounds the man is in fact coming after you.
Your birth record itself is the first. Listings companies compile records in huge databases that can be categorized by city race or any demographic. Wonder why you start getting “children’s” advertisements when you reach elementary school? Credit card validations from banks you’ve never been to? (don’t sign up for those) As soon as you turn 50 you’ll start receiving AARP magazine no matter what you do. But by that age you’ll have accumulated a data trail that could chronicle all the important facts of your life.
Public records are the souce of most of the targeted marketing in your life. You file records for many of the processes in your life from starting a business to buying a house and each time a searchable record is filed much of it available online. From these records a listing company can find your name age address phone numbers emails occupation income and large purchases like a car or home. You could purchase the addresses and emails of every business owner within 50 miles of your house and send them a postcard with their name on it.
Public records are just the beginning. Most of us don’t read the verbose terms and conditions attached to each online purchase that we make. What you’ll find is a lot of words that translate to: We won’t sell your information… much. Amazon.com mentions selling information about products purchased three times in its privacy policy. It seems to cover all its bases until you realize that according to the privacy policy anyone Amazon.com considers a “business partner” might be privy to the personal information of buyers and sellers. A business partner could be some who engages in the business of buying your information from Amazon.com.
In the meantime you’ve probably had your Facebook profile opted into another new initiative. Facebook has a habit of doing this each time a new feature is added. They will add the new feature to your account without asking you and leave an unpublished and often complicated path to removal. This was true with Facebook Connect which features innovative applications that can help you integrate your network of friends with your interests activities and daily travels. But they come with huge privacy concerns.
Facebook Connect if not disabled automatically tells any site that has signed up that you visited the site. Normally in order to find who visits their site a company would have to subpoena the Internet Service Provider for your IP address and track you down. It allows any website with a “like” button (which is very easy to add) to see that you visited. That means your name your age what bands you like and who you got drunk with last weekend are all available to every website with little effort.
You can remove this function but it’s important to know the things you CAN’T block. You can’t hide your name and you can’t hide anything you “like.” Any fan page TV show movie or interest that you “like” on Facebook is public information that can’t be hidden by changing your privacy settings.
While it’s the most widely used Facebook is just one of hundreds of sites we pour our information into willingly without comprehending the privacy they do (or don’t) promise us. Any slightly tech-savvy and determined investigator can have a chronology of your whole life with no tool but a keyboard. Solution? Delete your Facebook close your bank accounts buy only in cash and never fill out another online form again? I suppose there’s a rational behind companies that seem to eliminate more and more of their privacy options. When it comes down to it our privacy just isn’t worth that much to us.