3 ms·

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

trowawee 10y ago
Given sufficient data, nothing's really anonymous. That's a bullshit hedge.
- mootothemax 10y 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 10y 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 10y 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 10y 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 10y 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 10y ago
  [deleted]
davesque 10y 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?

trowawee 10y ago

Given sufficient data, nothing's really anonymous. That's a bullshit hedge.

mootothemax 10y 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 10y 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 10y 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 10y 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 10y 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 10y ago
[deleted]

davesque 10y 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?