Amazon tracks every single thing you do on their site. Every Kindle book, all of your "last read" spots, every bookmark, every note is stored on their servers. It's critical to syncing that information across multiple devices.
Meanwhile, every paper book or DVD or garden implement you browse or buy or add to your Wish List, it all gets tracked. And I'm sure they data mine the living crap out of all of it.
I can understand how you may not like it; if that's the case, then you shouldn't patronize Amazon. Perfectly reasonable.
Sony is not exactly a paragon of customer data and privacy protection either, though. It wasn't that long ago that Sony literally
installed a rootkit on your computer when you played a CD that was published by Sony BMG. So I wouldn't be too shocked if Sony added a similar capability to their software at some point....
Separately, it appears that some Ayn Rand books are in the public domain, others are not. Chances are the screener made an error, and they didn't catch it for a few days. I concur that better screening is obviously beneficial, but I think the comments speculating that Amazon puts no effort into verifying a copyright claim (by the original commenter) is either slightly absurd or disingenuous. I don't see what "authoritative source" he's waiting to weigh in -- since it's most likely the copyright holder who complained in the first place.