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SoylentNews is people

posted by cmn32480 on Wednesday May 13 2015, @10:37AM   Printer-friendly
from the we-await-the-shitstorm dept.

I'm about to give up.

On the one hand, I see countless people get loyalty cards and enjoy discounts on their purchases. They connect with friends on Facebook and Twitter. They use apps on android or apple smartphones to give them turn-by-turn directions, find out where their friends are, or find places of interest. Their e-mail is "in the cloud" where they can get to it from multiple places. They use services like dropbox to share files. They get their news on-line and read e-books. I could go on and on.

On the other hand, I see opportunities for tracking and profiling in every one of those activities. So much so that it seems like one would be under constant observation and surveillance. We are just data points to be sliced and diced and marketed to — a society of consumers rather than customers.

So, I've got a major "ick factor" knowing about these practices and yet I'm hard-pressed to explain any negative consequences to otherwise intelligent people. "I don't do anything that's THAT interesting." "I've done nothing wrong, so I don't worry about it." "I like getting the bonuses and discounts."

Yet, I see companies expend great amounts of money implementing tracking mechanisms such as cookies, super-cookies, clear gifs, as well as huge databases of purchases, travels, and interests. I don't believe they are doing this for purely philanthropic reasons.

In no particular order, I include these for consideration:

I use a variety of Addons while browsing the web using Pale Moon: a custom HOSTS file, Self-Destructing Cookies, Ad-Block Plus, Ghostery, NoScript, Better Privacy, Flashblock, and Ref Control. I have a firewall and use anti-virus products. "In real life" I prefer to use cash over charge cards for my purchases. I have no loyalty cards.

What say you Soylentils? Am I being unreasonably paranoid? Or not paranoid enough? What dangers, really, are there? Why not sign up for all those loyalty cards and social apps? What privacy protections do YOU use?

 
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  • (Score: 3, Interesting) by PizzaRollPlinkett on Wednesday May 13 2015, @10:54AM

    by PizzaRollPlinkett (4512) on Wednesday May 13 2015, @10:54AM (#182311)

    I figure that loyalty cards aren't necessary to track you. Retailers have POS data from payments - unless you take wads of cash to Wal-Mart! - and your purchases, so they can data mine that if they want to. Wal-Mart doesn't have loyalty cards and is probably the most sophisticated retailer for big data and logistics. The only way to really opt out of tracking is to use cash only, and almost no one carries huge wads of cash around to make basic purchases. I figure most purchase data is really, really, really boring and wouldn't tell you much. Week after week of pizza rolls and toilet paper. If I was going to buy explosives or something, I'd use cash.

    Usually, loyalty cards aren't that great of a deal. You might get something, but for example I looked at a drugstore card and while you get these convoluted "points" when you buy stuff which you can later redeem, but the in-store prices are higher than Wal-Mart, so you don't come out ahead.

    Bed Bath and Beyond sends barcode-tracking mailers with 20% off to see if you visit their store. I used to think getting batteries there with this coupon was a good deal, but I noticed that recently batteries cost the same at Wal-Mart as the 20% off BBB price.

    So the short answer is these loyalty cards and promos aren't really that great of a deal, and the data they get tracking you is probably not very interesting.

    What's really funny is how utterly awful companies are at using the data they have. Barnes and Noble's recommendations are tragic. Recently their recommendations had a book I had already recently purchased. I mean, they already have all my order history. You'd think they could maybe filter out the books I already bought.

    --
    (E-mail me if you want a pizza roll!)
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  • (Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 13 2015, @11:57AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 13 2015, @11:57AM (#182324)

    and Netflix and Amazon Prime does the same for movie chooses. I already watched the movie and they suggest to me to watch it becuase I saw another moive. Geeh, guys.

    Now on-line marketers are just as bad. I looked at hard drive, and now they show me hard drive ads. A little too late. That goes for Amazon, New Egg, Fry's, Tiger Direct. They all can only talk about yesterday. Always behind the need.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 13 2015, @12:24PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 13 2015, @12:24PM (#182329)

    > The only way to really opt out of tracking is to use cash only, and almost no one carries huge wads of cash around to make basic purchases.

    It really isn't that hard. The times you need an actual "huge wad of cash" are pretty rare. Most of the time a couple of hundred bucks is more than enough. And yes, I speak from experience over the last 4 years or so.

    > I figure most purchase data is really, really, really boring and wouldn't tell you much.

    Which totally explains why so many spend so much money trying to acquire that information. It's just useless. [wsj.com]

    > So the short answer is these loyalty cards and promos aren't really that great of a deal,

    The best thing you can do is to simply refuse to shop at stores with loyalty cards. You will probably save money in the process. [wsj.com]

    > What's really funny is how utterly awful companies are at using the data they have.

    That's because profiling information is not useful for making recommendations. That is a hard AI problem that has yet to be solved because figuring out what you are likely to want requires running a simulation of your personality. Marketing analytics isn't about selling you stuff you need, it is about figuring out how to manipulate you into buying whatever the client has hired them to sell. Like Target figuring out that women are pregnant [forbes.com] in order to push them into switching to shopping at Target for more stuff. It is all about figuring out how to press your buttons.

    • (Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 13 2015, @12:51PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 13 2015, @12:51PM (#182338)
      >The best thing you can do is to simply refuse to shop at stores with loyalty cards.

      It works well as a short-term weight loss plan, but I can't recommend "simply don't buy groceries" as a lifestyle.
      • (Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 13 2015, @12:56PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 13 2015, @12:56PM (#182340)

        > It works well as a short-term weight loss plan, but I can't recommend "simply don't buy groceries" as a lifestyle.

        Here is a short list of places in the USA that sell groceries and do not have loyalty cards, they cover the entire spectrum of pricing:

        Wal-mart
        Market Basket
        Aldi
        Trader Joes
        Whole Foods
        Sprouts
        Save-a-Lot
        Target
        Various produce stands & farmers' markets

        • (Score: 2) by tadas on Wednesday May 13 2015, @01:31PM

          by tadas (3635) on Wednesday May 13 2015, @01:31PM (#182359)

          ....Shopper's Food Warehouse......

        • (Score: 2) by Kromagv0 on Wednesday May 13 2015, @03:08PM

          by Kromagv0 (1825) on Wednesday May 13 2015, @03:08PM (#182409) Homepage

          Not quite correct. Target while not having a card has something probably more egregious, a smartphone app called cartwheel [target.com] that gives you discounts on a rotating subset of things. I tried it and there are very few things that I get a discount on as I don't buy much of any premade food. While I do buy premade stuff (bread, pasta/noodles, salsa) they are low margin items and don't get a special discount very often if at all.

          --
          T-Shirts and bumper stickers [zazzle.com] to offend someone
      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 13 2015, @11:58PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 13 2015, @11:58PM (#182714)

        Do they only have megacorporations where you are?
        Have all the locally-owned shops folded?

        I guess I'm lucky where I live.
        There are places here [google.com] that are large enough to have decent prices but small enough to not have the abusive practices of the multinationals.

        ...and I can't imagine applying for a loyalty card that requires verified data.
        Heh. Just for fun, I can imagine constantly exchanging cards with someone else to further mess with the data collection.

        -- gewg_

    • (Score: 2) by hemocyanin on Wednesday May 13 2015, @03:02PM

      by hemocyanin (186) on Wednesday May 13 2015, @03:02PM (#182405) Journal

      Some ways to get the discount without being a _good_ loyalty card customer.

      #1: Jenny's got you covered. Enter Jenny's phone number in the form of: [your_area_code] 867-5309
      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6WTdTwcmxyo [youtube.com]
      The hard part is not saying it as 8675-309.
      The worst part is that some stores have added this number to an invalid list.

      #2: Ask the person in line in front of you to swipe their card for you.

      #3: Get a new card every time.

      #4: Somebody write up Android/IOS app that allows card swapping. Poisoning the loyalty card data would be the ultimate "Fuck You" -- way better than opting out. This is the idea: http://soylentnews.org/comments.pl?sid=7296&cid=178524 [soylentnews.org]

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 13 2015, @03:24PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 13 2015, @03:24PM (#182419)

        > Some ways to get the discount without being a _good_ loyalty card customer.

        Read the 2nd linked WSJ article.

        It is generally against your interest to even walk into a place that uses loyalty card schemes because the pricing on all the stuff that is not discounted today is way too high. So unless you are only buying stuff that is discounted on the day you are shopping you are going to get screwed.

        The only winning move is not to play.

        • (Score: 2) by hemocyanin on Wednesday May 13 2015, @04:50PM

          by hemocyanin (186) on Wednesday May 13 2015, @04:50PM (#182459) Journal

          There isn't a single drug store in my area where I can opt out. So I have to play.

          • (Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 13 2015, @05:45PM

            by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 13 2015, @05:45PM (#182488)

            If you are buying prescription drugs, then check out: http://www.goodrx.com/ [goodrx.com]

            At least you can get the cheapest price with or without a card.

            • (Score: 3, Insightful) by kaszz on Wednesday May 13 2015, @07:11PM

              by kaszz (4211) on Wednesday May 13 2015, @07:11PM (#182551) Journal

              Online buying is certainly tracked real good..

              • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 14 2015, @12:35AM

                by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 14 2015, @12:35AM (#182730)

                Goodrx has nothing to do with online buying.

                If you buy prescription drugs and didn't bother to click that link, you are being stupid.

        • (Score: 2) by kaszz on Wednesday May 13 2015, @07:17PM

          by kaszz (4211) on Wednesday May 13 2015, @07:17PM (#182555) Journal

          If you can generate a loyalty card on the fly, you can also screw the system.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 13 2015, @12:30PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 13 2015, @12:30PM (#182331)

    Retailers have POS data from payments - unless you take wads of cash to Wal-Mart!

    I don't know how much you typically buy, but normally I don't pay a huge amount. And yes, I almost always pay in cash.

    Now, things like computers I typically buy online, and therefore certainly not with cash, and the shop knows my name and address. But then, knowing the type of computer I have won't tell them much, and if from my purchasing behaviour they learn that I prefer Linux (all my computers except for my very first one were obtained either without operating system, or with preinstalled Linux), that's one thing I don't mind them learning.

  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by captain normal on Wednesday May 13 2015, @03:11PM

    by captain normal (2205) on Wednesday May 13 2015, @03:11PM (#182411)

    You don't have to give up information to get the discount cards. I carry several in my car. The cashiers hand them out after they ask, "are you a member?", then give you a mail in form or a page with a website for you can fill in the info later. I never fill in the info. I've been using Safeway, RiteAid, CVS and Ace discount cards for years. I use cash for all day to day purchases. Only using my cards for things like online flight reservations, car rental etc. There is no reason to give these companies any information.

    --
    When life isn't going right, go left.
    • (Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Wednesday May 13 2015, @06:10PM

      by DeathMonkey (1380) on Wednesday May 13 2015, @06:10PM (#182509) Journal

      They've got an unique ID that represents you and your purchases. You don't need to give them your actual phone number to give them information about yourself. Even rotating through several different cards is just obfuscation, e.g. security through obscurity.

      • (Score: 2) by captain normal on Thursday May 14 2015, @01:16AM

        by captain normal (2205) on Thursday May 14 2015, @01:16AM (#182745)

        They don't have my name, address, email or phone number. I just give them the card to scan when I go through the check out. Though I suppose it will only be a matter of time till the security cameras capture my image and they try to use facial recognition software to try to ID me. Maybe TSA and NSA have that capacity now, but I think it will be years before retail operations will be able to have access to databases like driver licences and passports, if ever.

        --
        When life isn't going right, go left.
        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 15 2015, @07:13AM

          by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 15 2015, @07:13AM (#183265)

          > They don't have my name, address, email or phone number. I just give them the card to scan when I go through the check out.

          All it takes is one time, one mistake and then they have your entire purchasing history connected to your identity. Maybe that time you had less cash in your wallet than you thought and instead of having the cashier unbag some of the stuff so they could take it off the bill you just decide fuck it and pay with the credit card. That is all it takes - your privacy is very, very brittle.

          > Though I suppose it will only be a matter of time till the security cameras capture my image and they try to use facial recognition software to try to ID me.

          They do not need anything so fancy. All it takes is a license plate scanner at the entrance to the parking lot. They cross-reference the list of plates in the lot with purchases and after just a handful of samples they can connect your loyalty card number with your license plate number.

          BTW, Target has been putting license plate scanners in their parking lots for nearly a decade now. [youtube.com]

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 14 2015, @02:50AM

        by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 14 2015, @02:50AM (#182771)

        They don't have a useful "unique ID" because I literally give them nothing. Not my name, email, phone number; nothing. So if they have some sort of unique ID, it is literally useless on me.

  • (Score: 2, Funny) by nitehawk214 on Wednesday May 13 2015, @04:36PM

    by nitehawk214 (1304) on Wednesday May 13 2015, @04:36PM (#182451)

    I am pretty sure I don't need to see your loyalty card stats to know you buy a lot of pizza rolls.

    --
    "Don't you ever miss the days when you used to be nostalgic?" -Loiosh