4 ms·

Maybe - insurance companies could start using your shopping habits to inform your risk group and therefore premiums. I could see other nefarious uses like track

Maybe - insurance companies could start using your shopping habits to inform your risk group and therefore premiums. I could see other nefarious uses like tracking when female customers get pregnant for purposes of enforcing abortion bans or targeting of individuals by anti-abortion groups. I think it's a mistake to underestimate the imagination of insurance adjusters and bureaucrats when it comes to how personal data could be used.

toss1 4y ago
Yup, this is definitely on the table since I just read the headline this morning that VA Gov Youngkin announced his opposition to a bill that would prevent law enforcement from seeking and collecting menstrual cycle data [0]. IOW, the governor of a major state (and the party that likes to tout "small government") is fully onboard with tracking your most intimate health data in order to prosecute people for medical decisions they don't like. In comparison, use of shopping data to prosecute people will be completely ordinary. I'd like to see someone get convicted and sue the stores for tracking them without consent. Everyone thinks surveillance capitalism is only harmful to privacy. They are wrong — it is literally the enabling technology for a totalitarian state. But sure, by all means, improve your next quarterly profits and nevermind the proto-fascists in the wings drooling over your tools... [0]https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2023/02/14/youngkin-menstrual-data-abortion-virginia/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2023/02/14/youngkin-...
- dauut 4y ago
  Thank you for both of your answers. I see that mostly health and insurance related concerns are valid and serious.
lotsofpulp 4y ago
In the US, Affordable Care Act limits health insurance pricing to be based on just a few parameters: https://www.healthcare.gov/how-plans-set-your-premiums/ https://www.healthcare.gov/how-plans-set-your-premiums/ It is a political exercise though, seeing as how it was politically acceptable for tobacco users to not be subsidized by non tobacco users, but it is okay for alcohol users to be subsidized by non alcohol users. Similarly, it is okay for excessive sugar and carbohydrate consumers to be subsidized by appropriate carbohydrate consumers. Or exercise and non exercise...etc
- BeFlatXIII 4y ago
  > It is a political exercise though, seeing as how it was politically acceptable for tobacco users to not be subsidized by non tobacco users, but it is okay for alcohol users to be subsidized by non alcohol users. Smokers stink up the area with secondhand smoke while boozers don't have an inherent stinkiness to their activity.

toss1 4y ago

Yup, this is definitely on the table since I just read the headline this morning that VA Gov Youngkin announced his opposition to a bill that would prevent law enforcement from seeking and collecting menstrual cycle data [0]. IOW, the governor of a major state (and the party that likes to tout "small government") is fully onboard with tracking your most intimate health data in order to prosecute people for medical decisions they don't like. In comparison, use of shopping data to prosecute people will be completely ordinary. I'd like to see someone get convicted and sue the stores for tracking them without consent. Everyone thinks surveillance capitalism is only harmful to privacy. They are wrong — it is literally the enabling technology for a totalitarian state. But sure, by all means, improve your next quarterly profits and nevermind the proto-fascists in the wings drooling over your tools... [0]https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2023/02/14/youngkin-menstrual-data-abortion-virginia/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2023/02/14/youngkin-...

dauut 4y ago
Thank you for both of your answers. I see that mostly health and insurance related concerns are valid and serious.

lotsofpulp 4y ago

In the US, Affordable Care Act limits health insurance pricing to be based on just a few parameters: https://www.healthcare.gov/how-plans-set-your-premiums/ https://www.healthcare.gov/how-plans-set-your-premiums/ It is a political exercise though, seeing as how it was politically acceptable for tobacco users to not be subsidized by non tobacco users, but it is okay for alcohol users to be subsidized by non alcohol users. Similarly, it is okay for excessive sugar and carbohydrate consumers to be subsidized by appropriate carbohydrate consumers. Or exercise and non exercise...etc

BeFlatXIII 4y ago
> It is a political exercise though, seeing as how it was politically acceptable for tobacco users to not be subsidized by non tobacco users, but it is okay for alcohol users to be subsidized by non alcohol users. Smokers stink up the area with secondhand smoke while boozers don't have an inherent stinkiness to their activity.