4 ms·

If they sell your receipt data to Uber, who else might they sell it to? An insurance company? A hedge fund? Your bank?

savanaly 9y ago
>anonymized It would be much bigger news if they were selling data that could be used against the consumers on an individual basis.
- trowawee 9y ago
  Given sufficient data, nothing's really anonymous. That's a bullshit hedge.
  - mootothemax 9y ago
    Especially if eg Facebook notification emails count as transactional. Group memberships alone massively narrow things down. Throw in a few business notifications and it's game over. Even without that angle, I find it absolutely scandalous that a company is able to do this, even with the T&Cs permission of their users. Surely at some point this is going to bite them in the behind? The possibilities of it going massively wrong seem endless. Then again - common sense and the law rarely seem to intersect.
    - ethbro 9y ago
      The problem is likely suable entities. I'd imagine there's a fair number of corporate cut-outs in shady schemes like this. With the expectation that if there are ever lawsuits a sacrificial faux-company goes bankrupt and takes the damages.
- JorgeGT 9y ago
  "Hmm, 90% of this anonymous guy rides start/end at this residential address which the public property deed says it's registered to Mr. John Smith, I wonder who this anonymous guy could be."
  - greenyoda 9y ago
    ...and 10% of John's rides are to an address whose only tenant is a drug addiction rehab clinic, but he apparently doesn't work there because 50% of his rides are from a tech company's headquarters to his home late at night. So it looks like John may have a little bit of a drug problem. You can find out a lot of personal information about someone by tracking where they go on a regular basis.
    - JorgeGT 9y ago
      Yep, once I plotted my Google location history and played this game looking at my "hot spots". Even if you work at a large company and don't go to special places it's very easy to gather insight by looking, for instance, where a person goes in certain dates: he spends Christmas in this village, he stays home in Valentine's day, etc.
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
- davesque 9y ago
  Is there an actual law that would prohibit them from selling un-anonymized emails or do we just have to trust the company's sense for ethical behavior?
gdulli 9y ago
They would never know who "your" bank is. Reading a few paragraphs near the top of the privacy policy could have cleared up the initial misunderstanding about the nature of the service and also any FUD about how the data is used.
- morgante 9y ago
  Presumably your bank is the one sending you statement emails...

>anonymized It would be much bigger news if they were selling data that could be used against the consumers on an individual basis.

trowawee 9y ago
Given sufficient data, nothing's really anonymous. That's a bullshit hedge.
- mootothemax 9y ago
  Especially if eg Facebook notification emails count as transactional. Group memberships alone massively narrow things down. Throw in a few business notifications and it's game over. Even without that angle, I find it absolutely scandalous that a company is able to do this, even with the T&Cs permission of their users. Surely at some point this is going to bite them in the behind? The possibilities of it going massively wrong seem endless. Then again - common sense and the law rarely seem to intersect.
  - ethbro 9y ago
    The problem is likely suable entities. I'd imagine there's a fair number of corporate cut-outs in shady schemes like this. With the expectation that if there are ever lawsuits a sacrificial faux-company goes bankrupt and takes the damages.
JorgeGT 9y ago
"Hmm, 90% of this anonymous guy rides start/end at this residential address which the public property deed says it's registered to Mr. John Smith, I wonder who this anonymous guy could be."
- greenyoda 9y ago
  ...and 10% of John's rides are to an address whose only tenant is a drug addiction rehab clinic, but he apparently doesn't work there because 50% of his rides are from a tech company's headquarters to his home late at night. So it looks like John may have a little bit of a drug problem. You can find out a lot of personal information about someone by tracking where they go on a regular basis.
  - JorgeGT 9y ago
    Yep, once I plotted my Google location history and played this game looking at my "hot spots". Even if you work at a large company and don't go to special places it's very easy to gather insight by looking, for instance, where a person goes in certain dates: he spends Christmas in this village, he stays home in Valentine's day, etc.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
davesque 9y ago
Is there an actual law that would prohibit them from selling un-anonymized emails or do we just have to trust the company's sense for ethical behavior?

gdulli 9y ago

They would never know who "your" bank is. Reading a few paragraphs near the top of the privacy policy could have cleared up the initial misunderstanding about the nature of the service and also any FUD about how the data is used.

morgante 9y ago
Presumably your bank is the one sending you statement emails...