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A privacy advocacy group has filed a formal legal complaint with the US Federal Trade Commission, asking the agency to begin an investigation "into Google's in-store tracking algorithm to determine whether it adequately protects the privacy of millions of American consumers."
In the Monday filing, the Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) said it is concerned with Google's new Store Sales Management program, which debuted in May. The system allows the company to extend its online tracking capabilities into the physical world. The idea is to combine credit card and other financial data acquired from data brokers to create a singular profile as a way to illustrate to companies what goods and services are being searched for online, which result in actual in-person sales.
Because the algorithm that Google uses is secret, EPIC says, there is no way to determine how well Google's claimed anonymization feature—to mask names, credit card numbers, location, and other potentially private data—actually works. While Google has been cagey about exactly how it does this, the company has previously revealed that the technique is based on CryptDB.
"The foundational algorithm on which the Google algorithm is based has known security flaws," the complaint states. "In 2015, researchers were able to hack into a CryptDB protected database of healthcare records and access over 50 percent (sometimes 100 percent) of sensitive patient data at an individual level." (Ars covered the 2015 research into CryptDB at the time that it came out.)
Worse still, it seems practically impossible for consumers to do anything about this potential tracking in EPIC's view.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday August 02 2017, @09:21PM (19 children)
Then of course they'll hook up facial recognition at the cash registers and get you that way.
We should all begin to practice vote-with-your-feet-ism. It's the only thing any of them will listen to. Cable customers complained for years that they were being overcharged for hundreds of channels they never watched. The cable companies couldn't have cared less about any of that, so they did nothing. Now that cord-cutting is accelerating, the cable companies are only belatedly offering custom packages hoping to stem the slide. Customers complained that scheduled programming was inconvenient, but the cable companies didn't respond until people started buying lots of DVRs to do their own time-shifting and commercial skipping.
Likewise shoppers complained for years that high fructose corn syrup was giving everybody diabetes, but the companies did nothing and the government did nothing until everyone just stopped buying those products. You have to look hard now to find products with HFCS, whereas many brands of soda and other processed foods are touting natural sugar and sweetener alternatives. Soda, in fact, as a category is under a lot of pressure because consumers have opted for water, sparkling water, and vitamin-enriched water.
So shoppers should do the same sort of thing with respect to their purchasing behavior and avoid spending money at supermarkets that track them like this. People who live in cities can buy food at greenmarkets or use CSAs or eat at food trucks if they don't want to cook. People who live in the suburbs or in rural places can grow their own food in gardens and fields. There are even heirloom/organic seed banks you can use to avoid the Monsantos of the world.
Nothing less will curb corporate and government overreach.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Wednesday August 02 2017, @09:48PM (7 children)
What's "CSA" ?
Anyway what you mention points all in one direction. Realpolitik and "business is WAR" as Tramiel said is the way to do it. Don't ask, squeeze the business and government to do the right thing or suffer the immediate consequences.
(Score: 2) by leftover on Wednesday August 02 2017, @11:33PM
Community Supported Agriculture. You sign up for a series of food baskets to be delivered as the produce becomes available. A co-op between producers and consumers.
Bent, folded, spindled, and mutilated.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Thursday August 03 2017, @12:02PM (5 children)
"Community Supported Agriculture." Basically the deal is you sign up and every week you get a box of fresh produce straight off organic farms in the area. You don't know what you're gonna get, except that it's an assortment of produce that's ripe. With most of them you can also get fresh eggs and milk. It's cheap, and you don't have to deal with the supermarket. The produce actually has flavor because it's picked when it's ripe and because they're usually heirloom varieties instead of factory farm stuff selected to look good on a supermarket shelf and picked weeks before it's ready. In short, it's cheaper than what you buy at the store, it tastes better, it's better for you, and you get to stick it to the Man. What's not to love?
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Thursday August 03 2017, @03:42PM (1 child)
What's not to love?
Eating in winter.
Scale-ability.
Choice.
Variety.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Friday August 04 2017, @02:57AM
Canning and preserves. Root vegetables. Greenhouses. It's how my family did it when I was a kid.
Most Americans have scaled up too much, and should scale back before their scales break. Or, perhaps you mean in terms of supply networks, in which case a CSA or green market are probably going to be more efficient because most of the produce at supermarkets is thrown away.
You have more choice when growing your own or getting produce at a greenmarket. Most supermarkets in America give you the choice of red delicious apples or granny smith. My local green market has more on the order of 20 varieties. CSAs don't have that level of choice, because you get what's in season, but they also give you a lot more variety than most Americans are used to eating. How many people even know what Tuscan kale is?
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Friday August 04 2017, @03:06AM (2 children)
I like the idea of FarmBots even better though.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Friday August 04 2017, @03:18AM (1 child)
Farmbots sound like a good idea until they start asking "why?" and take to announcing, "We are Geth [wikia.com]."
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Friday August 04 2017, @03:42AM
Farmbots won't need that level of cognitive abilities. It's not much more complicated than existing grass-cutter-bots.
But the advantage of cutting out commercial farming perverted incentives, GMO industry, pesticides, middle men, distribution vulnerabilities etc is attractive. It may even be cheaper. Most likely it will be more nutritious and tasty.
(Score: 2) by edIII on Wednesday August 02 2017, @10:08PM (2 children)
Home Depot is already doing it. Cameras along with ~10" LCD screens showing your face buying the product. I'm positive that every transaction recorded in a database has a blob field with a picture of the customers face.
Technically, lunchtime is at any moment. It's just a wave function.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 03 2017, @06:51AM (1 child)
With facial recognition, though?
(Score: 2) by t-3 on Thursday August 03 2017, @03:17PM
Yes, there are large facial-recognition databases, mainly used, per my understanding, to alert security to serial shoplifters. Home Depot, being one of the most automated/computerized chains in the US, as well as a big target for thieves, almost certainly uses and contributes to these databases.
(Score: 1) by Virindi on Wednesday August 02 2017, @10:30PM (1 child)
I see what you did there.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 03 2017, @02:21PM
With CO2, we are all under a lot of pressure!!!!!
Eh? Eh?
I'll show myself out.
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 02 2017, @11:55PM (4 children)
voting with your feet works until the industry(s) for important things that practically everyone uses gets monopolized. And the rate of monopolization is accelerating, if anything.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Thursday August 03 2017, @01:18PM (3 children)
Well, look at it from another perspective. Tally up the things you have to buy and the services you must have. Imagine yourself on a desert island, if it helps. Do you really need that cocktail shaker? Does a larger TV really make that much difference? Can you not sit in rush hour traffic just as well in a $10K car as in a $60K one (maybe a bike would work as well or better...)? As you go through the exercise, you'll probably find that the list of things you must have and that you cannot make or do yourself is much shorter than you initially thought.
Further, you might find that for the things you don't have that you must have, you can as often as not get that thing used for a song and it will be perfectly serviceable. Occasionally, you can even find somebody giving it away, if you check on Freecycle or Craig's List. If it's something like clothing or furniture or what-have-you and you're worried about what other people might say, call it "vintage" and they'll nod and think you're so fashion-forward.
In other words, begin a process of divesting yourself from the monopolies. An easy first step is to stop paying for music and movies and get what you want off a torrent. A couple of curmudgeons who have been drinking the koolaid for 60 years will scream at you, but nobody else will look at you sideways. Another easy step is to stop paying for software. Make the transition to FLOSS. That's super easy these days. Stop eating fast food. It's bad for you and expensive. Stop buying toothpaste and use a mix of baking soda and salt (if you check the labels on whitening toothpaste the active ingredient is, you guessed it, baking soda) instead. And so on. Pretty soon you'll find that your credit card bills have gone way down, your anxiety has gone way down, and the satisfaction at having regained control of your life will have gone way up.
Some people will have circumstances that prevent them from doing that. If you have diabetes, you have to have that insulin. But nearly everyone can be much more self-sufficient than they have been conditioned to believe.
Also, after 20 years of having worked in advertising, having seen the raw data for market conversions, and time having had a window into the heart of government and seeing that raw data, I can assure you that we citizens don't have to make these changes in the millions to bring the corporations and monopolies to their knees. A few ten thousand will do. For example, for a large corporate pharmaceutical brand you've definitely heard of, a campaign that brings in 2,000 more customers than before is considered a solid win. If conversely that brand lost 10,000 customers, heads would roll.
So let's vote with our feet. The governments and the corporations they answer to don't listen to anything else.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 03 2017, @03:07PM
I would have to think the car for 10k would have more security involved in its sale and purchase, because only shifty sub-prime candidates would buy a crummy car like that and they are likely to skip out on paying their loan and the repo man will need photos and personal info to better know what he is dealing with when it comes time to collect.
Once it is established, it doesn't matter who you are, the business you are in, or if you pay cash, credit, or totally nonymous Bitcoins (which at best was privacy through obscurity) -- Businesses are going to keep the privacy violations going until something forces them to stop.
Voting with your feet just gets you in front of another person's camera, it seems.
Maybe someone with enough motivation can make a list of companies that choose not to do that. The problem is, most businesses do not openly advertise the fact they are tracking you.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 03 2017, @04:56PM
I'm all for a more sane approach to entertainment distribution (no DRM, cheaper prices for the world market through the net, elimination of the marketing/distribution people, eliminate advertising from paid products) but torrenting everything will eventually just lead to a crack down. Support the creators you respect and who respect your freedom and privacy. Torrenting only gives the **AAsses legitimacy for pushing their draconian bullshit.
Aside from that I'm all for boycotting but how do you propose to accomplish such a feat? Any central source of boycott info will either be subverted, or the power will corrupt and boycotts will be abused. Beyond that, most people operate from a perspective of convenience, how do you reach the necessary 10k? What about the large food companies who's brands are so extensive that it wouldn't actually be possible to boycott and feed a city?
You need some sort of objective standards, and once a company drops below some threshold they go on the boycott list. You then need to tie in such a system to a database that is easy for people to search such that it is a couple of seconds to find out if a product should be boycotted.
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Friday August 04 2017, @03:46AM
Buy abroad?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 03 2017, @01:06AM
Finally, a proper usage of "couldn't have cared less"!