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“The extent of consumer profiling today means that data brokers often know as much – or even more – about us than our family and friends, including our online a

“The extent of consumer profiling today means that data brokers often know as much – or even more – about us than our family and friends, including our online and in-store purchases, our political and religious affiliations, our income and socioeconomic status, and more,” And this is where the NSA/FBI will go to collect data in the future. If, miracle of miracles, we manage to get the government out of our daily lives, they'll just write NSLs to these guys and in one swoop pick up tons of information from dozens of sources -- including data about people we associate with, since no warrant will be required. These guys were doing "interesting" things when I last looked five years ago. Who knows how bad it's gotten since then. ADD: I've thought this thing through several times, and the only way forward I see is either outlawing any collection and aggregation of private data outside of that directly needed to provide service, not ads -- or making all information collected from any source publicly available to all. I don't see the middle ground. (Sadly)

jchrisa 12y ago
I think there is a case to be made that a posture of restricting the use of this sort of data can be worse than encouraging a free for all. At least with a free-for-all kids can build interesting things no one would think of. The status quo essentially enforces that it can only be used by the powerful.
- DanielBMarkham 12y ago
  I agree. In a free-for-all, people would be aware of what was being collected and they would take action. In what we have now, the fact that the information exists, it's extent, and what happens to it remains secret. I say get it out there. In fact, it's wrong that a person can sit in a far-away city and spend ten bucks getting all the information they ever wanted to know about my neighbor because he shared it freely online, yet that same type of public knowledge is not available to the rest of the neighborhood for free. Freely-shared information has always been assumed to be local in nature -- you share it with somebody you are in proximity to. This is a good thing: keeps you from over-sharing.
- sliverstorm 12y ago
  It's almost like we're trying to ignore the Streisand effect when it comes to our personal communications. It's not a perfect parallel, but you'd think internet-savvy people should understand how hard it is to keep the cat in the damn bag!
  - JoshTriplett 12y ago
    > It's almost like we're trying to ignore the Streisand effect when it comes to our personal communications. There's a difference between trying to suppress published information and trying to prevent the collection of that data in the first place. The Streisand effect applies to the first of those.
    - sliverstorm 12y ago
      Right, I guess I'm basically inferring a corollary to the Streisand effect. The Streisand effect is that once information is out, it cannot be suppressed; I'm going for something more like, the information will eventually get out, it cannot be forever suppressed.
rayiner 12y ago
I'm more worried about the people who don't need the NSL's to get access to this data. Banks, credit card companies, employers, etc. There's a huge potential for abuse that's more likely to affect your average person who isn't a political dissident.
- DanielBMarkham 12y ago
  It's good that we can worry about different things, but you're kind of making my point for me -- if the information is available commercially, all you have to do is 1) have a business relationship with the broker, and 2) punch in a credit card number to get it, no matter who you are. What we're seeing is that the brokers aren't very keen on having everybody and their brother coming by to check out folks, so it's a quasi secret type of information. That's the worst of both worlds. By the way, I keep hearing that phone companies have already set up e-com sites for Law Enforcement to retrieve phone tracking records (which do not require a warrant) Punch in your department's credit card number, type in the guys phone number, and get a record of everywhere he's been. Pretty cool stuff if it's true, but, as I note, folks who do this stuff aren't very keen on letting the rest of us in on the action.
  - rayiner 12y ago
    I'm not disagreeing with you on the meta-point. I'm just saying, even if you're not afraid of the government you have reason to be afraid. As an aside, I think HN gets this message backwards. I think it strikes a stronger chord with people to talk about what their boss could do with this data than what LE could do.
    - DanielBMarkham 12y ago
      Don't know, don't care. I find debating whether the ship struck the iceberg on the left-hand side or the right-hand side a bit of a distraction from the effort underway to board the lifeboats.
      - rayiner 12y ago
mpyne 12y ago
> I see is either outlawing any collection and aggregation of private data outside of that directly needed to provide service, not ads That's close to what Germany does, if I understand their data privacy laws correctly. On the other hand I can imagine how it would go in the libertarian-style U.S.: "If statistical data analysis is outlawed then only outlaws will be able to crunch numbers!" Er, they'll probably think up a better catchphrase. But I think you see the point, it's hard to enforce laws which are inherently unenforceable without massive intrusion.
- esbranson 12y ago
  I think what you mean is "If selling private information is outlawed, then only outlaws will sell private information." Since I don't need private information about you to defend my life, I'm OK with that.

jchrisa 12y ago

I think there is a case to be made that a posture of restricting the use of this sort of data can be worse than encouraging a free for all. At least with a free-for-all kids can build interesting things no one would think of. The status quo essentially enforces that it can only be used by the powerful.

DanielBMarkham 12y ago
I agree. In a free-for-all, people would be aware of what was being collected and they would take action. In what we have now, the fact that the information exists, it's extent, and what happens to it remains secret. I say get it out there. In fact, it's wrong that a person can sit in a far-away city and spend ten bucks getting all the information they ever wanted to know about my neighbor because he shared it freely online, yet that same type of public knowledge is not available to the rest of the neighborhood for free. Freely-shared information has always been assumed to be local in nature -- you share it with somebody you are in proximity to. This is a good thing: keeps you from over-sharing.
sliverstorm 12y ago
It's almost like we're trying to ignore the Streisand effect when it comes to our personal communications. It's not a perfect parallel, but you'd think internet-savvy people should understand how hard it is to keep the cat in the damn bag!
- JoshTriplett 12y ago
  > It's almost like we're trying to ignore the Streisand effect when it comes to our personal communications. There's a difference between trying to suppress published information and trying to prevent the collection of that data in the first place. The Streisand effect applies to the first of those.
  - sliverstorm 12y ago
    Right, I guess I'm basically inferring a corollary to the Streisand effect. The Streisand effect is that once information is out, it cannot be suppressed; I'm going for something more like, the information will eventually get out, it cannot be forever suppressed.

rayiner 12y ago

I'm more worried about the people who don't need the NSL's to get access to this data. Banks, credit card companies, employers, etc. There's a huge potential for abuse that's more likely to affect your average person who isn't a political dissident.

DanielBMarkham 12y ago
It's good that we can worry about different things, but you're kind of making my point for me -- if the information is available commercially, all you have to do is 1) have a business relationship with the broker, and 2) punch in a credit card number to get it, no matter who you are. What we're seeing is that the brokers aren't very keen on having everybody and their brother coming by to check out folks, so it's a quasi secret type of information. That's the worst of both worlds. By the way, I keep hearing that phone companies have already set up e-com sites for Law Enforcement to retrieve phone tracking records (which do not require a warrant) Punch in your department's credit card number, type in the guys phone number, and get a record of everywhere he's been. Pretty cool stuff if it's true, but, as I note, folks who do this stuff aren't very keen on letting the rest of us in on the action.
- rayiner 12y ago
  I'm not disagreeing with you on the meta-point. I'm just saying, even if you're not afraid of the government you have reason to be afraid. As an aside, I think HN gets this message backwards. I think it strikes a stronger chord with people to talk about what their boss could do with this data than what LE could do.
  - DanielBMarkham 12y ago
    Don't know, don't care. I find debating whether the ship struck the iceberg on the left-hand side or the right-hand side a bit of a distraction from the effort underway to board the lifeboats.
    - rayiner 12y ago

mpyne 12y ago

> I see is either outlawing any collection and aggregation of private data outside of that directly needed to provide service, not ads That's close to what Germany does, if I understand their data privacy laws correctly. On the other hand I can imagine how it would go in the libertarian-style U.S.: "If statistical data analysis is outlawed then only outlaws will be able to crunch numbers!" Er, they'll probably think up a better catchphrase. But I think you see the point, it's hard to enforce laws which are inherently unenforceable without massive intrusion.

esbranson 12y ago
I think what you mean is "If selling private information is outlawed, then only outlaws will sell private information." Since I don't need private information about you to defend my life, I'm OK with that.