How To Stop AT&T From Selling Your Private Data To Advertisers 88
An anonymous reader writes "AT&T is ready to follow in its rivals' footsteps and begin selling the private usage data it collects from its subscribers' phones to advertisers. The data in question is anonymized, according to AT&T, but it includes very sensitive information such as customers' locations, Web browsing history, mobile app usage and more. Privacy is something of a hot button issue right now, so it is likely that a number of AT&T subscribers would prefer to not have their private data sold to advertisers. Luckily, there is a fast and easy way to opt out of AT&T's 'External Marketing and Analytics Reporting' program."
It's has and is being tried. (Score:2, Interesting)
Well, this is /was going on. [startribune.com]
I found that trying to find an article from the 90's (I think it was in the WSJ) about one man who tried to do just that - sue to get his personal information from the marketing firms - I think his strategy was to sue for monetary damages. IIRC/
The marketing people say that an individual's information isn't worth much but a list of thousands or millions of people is worth quite a bit.
Anyway, it's 2013 and the marketing industry (personal data industry) is as big and strong as ever.
Let's face it, all some big corp has to do is have their lobbyists go to Washington, spread some "gifts" around, and just whine how "it'll hurt their business" and America.
We NEED privacy laws like in Europe. We have this lop sided balance of power in this country.
log in with telephone number and password... (Score:5, Interesting)
hmmm... is this the password that by default if you've never set it is set to the 1st 4 digits of your Social Security Number, like it is for Bell South? and how many retries are you allowed on the login? it's not 9,999 is it? and what are the first 3 digits of a SSN? why that'll be the area you were born, which probably closely match with the area code of the telephone number. that just leaves 2 digits left to guess...
Re:Read the contract. (Score:4, Interesting)
I'm pretty sure some of the tiny letter stuff on your contract says that by signing the contract you give them full permission to do whatever they want with all the data they collect from you.
It gets better!
Somewhere in that contract you also sign away your right to sue them (particularly AT&T, I believe it was a lawsuit against them that legalized mandatory arbitration clause).
So... what you can do is to complain to an arbitrator employed by AT&T and see whether he/she rules for you or not.