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EA's 'Invasion of Privacy' Policy
Posted by
Zonk
on Sun Aug 20, '06 06:14 AM
from the quite-a-sack dept.
from the quite-a-sack dept.
Justus writes "Gamers with Jobs has posted an article covering EA's privacy policy for Xbox Live users. In a nutshell, by using an EA game over Xbox Live, you are automatically creating an 'EA Online' account and granting Electronic Arts the ability to collect your name, address, and credit card information, as well as a variety of demographic information about how you use their products. Not only that, they explicitly say that they may tie these demographics to your personal information — no anonymous aggregation here! When Gamers with Jobs asked EA and Microsoft about these issues, they were met with stony silence, a fact they attribute to the pending release of the new Madden game next week. Without an official comment from the companies involved, it certainly looks like EA has the most invasive privacy policy they could come up with."
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EA's 'Invasion of Privacy' Policy
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It's stories like this one...
(Score:5, Insightful)(http://gnulords.org/~colo)
Vote with your wallet - do _not_ buy products that fuck with your inalienable rights so badly.
Re:It's stories like this one...
(Score:5, Insightful)(http://theravensnest.org/ | Last Journal: Monday November 06, @02:24PM)
Inalienable does not mean it can't be taken away from you, it means it is inherent; an inalienable right is a right which is absolute, not one which is granted. I could shoot you in the face with a gun, for example, removing your inalienable right to life. It's quite a fluffy concept, one that has kept philosophers happy for quite a while. As always Wikipedia has more coverage [wikipedia.org].
Re:It's stories like this one...
(Score:4, Funny)I could shoot you in the face with a gun, for example, removing your inalienable right to life.
You think you can take ALL of us Mr. Vice President?
Re:It's stories like this one...
(Score:4, Funny)Deep breath...valium...exhale...
Yeah, vote with your wallet but don't act like it's the end of the world.
Re:It's stories like this one...
(Score:4, Interesting)You know, slashdot has so many readers, we ought to form a PAC for
Re:It's stories like this one...
(Score:4, Informative)If everyone that read this actually wrote a letter to congress (write to your rep, not just to congress as a whole) seeking stronger privacy laws, with a simple but well framed arguement why it's important to us, you would see real change. But we've got to make it an issue, because they are receiving letters every day about the war(s), about immigration, about the minimum wage increase. If you don't let them know it's important to you, even a strong advocate of privacy will have a hard time moving legislation through the commitees and floor. A PAC might buy us a representative or two in Congress, but it won't be enough to get people looking at the importance of the issue.
If you don't know how to get ahold of your rep, or for lack of political participation can't figure out who your rep is, visit here : www.congress.org
But be careful! I've read through their privacy policy, and it, much like EA's, is pretty invasive, including the option to sell your personal information. Still, you can use their site to figure out who you want to contact, and take matters to your own hands from there.
Best wishes
Mike
Re:It's stories like this one...
(Score:5, Insightful)(http://forechecker.blogspot.com/ | Last Journal: Monday November 27, @09:01AM)
It's insightful to remember the Scott McNealy [wikiquote.org] quote: "You have zero privacy. Get over it."
Easy solution
(Score:5, Insightful)(http://www.drivesentinel.co.uk/)
Re:Easy solution
(Score:5, Interesting)(http://www.securitydb.com/)
Re:Easy solution
(Score:4, Insightful)(http://sharpy.xox.pl/ | Last Journal: Wednesday September 14, @02:12PM)
Re:Easy solution
(Score:5, Insightful)As always, the best way to protect yourself is to lie through your teeth when asked for personal information and never, ever be even vaguely consistent across different requests. For instance, if you pretended to be an Albanian nun to get a NYT login, pretend to be a Portuguese sausage-maker with hobbies of sword-fighting and watch repair to get an IMDB login -- but don't mention anything ecclesiastical or Albanian.
EA's policies now public...
(Score:5, Funny)Re:EA's policies now public...
(Score:5, Funny)Are you sure you want to quit?
Yes
I am sorry, you have not yet completed 18 hour units of playtime, you must continue playing for another 16 hours to enable the Quit command.
Should be fully expaned on the frontpage
(Score:5, Insightful)(http://expatexp.blogspot.com/)
Looking forward to...
(Score:4, Insightful)(Last Journal: Monday October 02, @08:42AM)
Surprised?
(Score:5, Interesting)(http://obsessivemathsfreak.org/ | Last Journal: Friday June 09, @08:15PM)
Your data is worth money. Marketers are willing to buy it. Hence, companies will be willing and eager to sell it. They don't care. They're private companies, beholden to no one except their shareholders.
If you would like to give your explicit approval to this buy buying such a game, or tacit approval by buying any other EA game, then do so. That is your right. Just don't complain when your playing habits are vomited all over the net like so many AOL search results.
NO PRIVACY EXPRESSED OR IMPLIED
(Score:3, Interesting)(http://sharpy.xox.pl/ | Last Journal: Wednesday September 14, @02:12PM)
Most invasive?
(Score:2, Informative)Here is the privacy policy from the Safeway Club Card [safeway.com]:
Funny, too, that TFA picked EA's policy and didn't look at any other game company. Not to mention the fact that EA is gathering information that you provide. Sound like the kind of stupid EA bashing you would get from an astroturfing competitor.Re:Most invasive?
(Score:5, Interesting)(http://www.bash-shell.net/)
Re:Most invasive?
(Score:4, Informative)(Last Journal: Wednesday September 20, @10:30AM)
Tesco gives you 1p in the £1 of all you spend with them for the data which they are taking. Some people would think that this isn't worth it, so you can just not have one and still use their products and buy from them.
It seems with EA you have to do this or not use a product which you have paid for, which is a bit bad
Taking A Big Risk
(Score:2)(http://bluezhift.proliphus.com/ | Last Journal: Thursday October 26, @10:06AM)
Unfortunate, but it is the way the cookie crumbles
(Score:1)(http://www.2amrecords.com/ | Last Journal: Sunday August 20, @07:35AM)
What's the problem?
(Score:1)(http://tohveli.net/)
You wouldn't buy a product that says "Insecure!" on the box, would you?
-- dbg
Re:What's the problem?
(Score:5, Funny)(http://slashdot.org/ | Last Journal: Tuesday November 07, @05:52AM)
One more point for Nintendo...
(Score:5, Interesting)(http://www.modemaztech.com.ar/)
Why can't EA learn from Nintendo?
More info on http://www.nintendowifi.com/customersupport/Suppo
Being pedantic the assumption may be wrong.
(Score:1)(http://idunno.org/)
The policy states that MS will hand over the XBox Live account information, without stating what is in those account details. It could just be a username, or geographic details, or more. The details about acquiring credit card information is in a seperate paragraph, which includes the provisios "will vary depending upon the activity and may include".
Whilst it makes sense for an ea.com account created when purchasing an on-line game to have the credit card information the policy, as I read it, doesn't really say "they are granting themselves the authority to retrieve your private credit card information and much more from Microsoft in the process." that gamerswithjobs think it does.
But hey, nothing like hyperbole to get hits!
Not surprising...
(Score:4, Interesting)This, to me, is spyware, and customer data collection needs to be conspicuously disclosed (not buried in an EULA*), and it needs to be opt-in only, by law.
* The most infuriating part is that I read the EULA for CoD/CoD2, and I didn't see anything about them collecting my data and sending it home. They didn't disclose it at all.
Re:Not surprising...
(Score:4, Informative)(http://www.jasonlefkowitz.net/)
Uh oh
(Score:2)(Last Journal: Tuesday November 22, @11:44AM)
Here. If you don't like it do something.
(Score:5, Informative)Heres an information practice that could cause substantial consumer injury. EA is collecting my address, phone number, birth date, name, credit card information - usually the only other piece of information you need to charge the card is the three digit number at the back of the card. Some websites don't even require that. If you win a prize you also get to give them your SSN!!!
Do you trust your security to a three digit number? Do you trust a giant company to not have any disgruntled employees with access to the database? And a paper and pencil to circumvent the copy restrictions on the data (if they have that even). I trust EA to publish (mostly crappy sports) games and thats all. None of the other information they collect is necessary to run EA online. The very fact that they are collecting data they do not need makes me actively distrust them. This entire implictly agreeing to hand your data over smells fishy.
See that "File a complaint" [ftc.gov] link on the top of the FTC webpage. Ten minutes. Slashdot the damn thing - I'm sure the FTC will take notice. At very least they should be able to contact Microsoft and EA and be able to change what data is collected. Seriously the best way to deal with a stupid bunch of corporate lawyers is have a government agency snarl at them.
here's the problem
(Score:3, Funny)If you don't want to give credit card info to...
(Score:1)Guess what, /. might do it too...
(Score:1)All that has a monetary value. Does
As for MS and EA, i never put my credit card info in my console. XBOX Live is a great service, but i'm not about to provide my credit card account to the world on it.
Just buy a card at your local retailer and input the code in your console. That's all that's required.
BIG deal?
(Score:1)(http://knightgames.blogspot.com/ | Last Journal: Thursday March 03, @03:40PM)