Quote:
Originally Posted by GlenBarrington
As a retired Teradata DBA, I can assure you, every business on the planet collects information on its customers. Though sharing that information is rare, most businesses don't want their competitors to know about their customer base.
How do you think those tailored casino offers get made, or those coupons that spit out from the cash register in the supermarket get printed? What drives the oil change offers for your car that come in the mail? ...
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I know. At this point it's kind of fruitless to try to avoid it. I figure if they want to bore the hell out of themselves following my life, go for it.
And it's not just big corporations that give up the data. Our own government agencies sell this information. A few years ago I compiled mailing lists for a regional printer and would get mailing list catalogs sent to them. If I wanted to target people who registered a Mercedes Benz (for example, or any specific type of car) I could buy a mailing list for that, including name, address and phone number of the "target." Where would these mailing list sellers get this information? From the Department of Motor Vehicles of each state. If they're selling vehicle registration information, can you imagine what else the Federal and State governments are selling to the mailing list compilers? And this was ten to twelve years ago. I have no clue what it's like now.
The right to privacy is basically a joke in this country now.