9 Oct
2021
9 Oct
'21
7 a.m.
On Fri, Oct 08, 2021 at 12:32:34PM -0700, William Morder via tde-users wrote:
As I said earlier (I think it was the previous
thread), the data ought never
to be collected in the first place.
How do you propose that companies bill their customers if they are
prohibited from collecting data such as name, address, phone number and
services provided?
I work for an electrician. I cannot imagine how we could possibly have
customers at all if we can't record their address.
Before I worked for the electrician, I worked for an IT company. Most of
the time we could service their systems remotely, and so you might argue
that we didn't need to know their physical address or name, only their
IP address. But knowing their physical address and name protected us if
they failed to pay their bill.
My car mechanic knows my name, my address, phone number, the make and
model of my car, and when it is due for a service. He sends me a
reminder when it is due for a service, and a warning if there is a
recall on the car or its parts. He couldn't do that without collecting
my personal data.
There can be no ethical use of another
person's private information, when collected by such stealthy means and using
disingenous justifications.
I bought some books online yesterday. I prefer bricks and mortar shops,
but we're in lockdown here so it was online or nothing. While I was
purchasing, the website -- **not** Amazon -- showed me suggestions
"Other people who bought this book also purchased...".
Do you think that is unethical?
About twice a year the electrician I work for runs through the list
of customers that have solar panels that we installed or serviced, and
send them a reminder email that the panels should be cleaned yearly and
serviced every few years for best effectiveness.
Do you think that is unethical?
The insidiousness of the online privacy issue is that there is no hard
line between acceptable and unacceptable marketing. Its a slipperly
slope that starts at the foundations of the free market commerce and
ends with Facebook installing a chip in your brain to monitor everything
you do, and Google having veto over what you say to your friends down
the pub in case you make a "prohibited claim".
https://twitter.com/ggreenwald/status/1446576873694187522
I'm not saying that there is no line that should not be crossed, but
such blanket demands as "no data collection at all!" is unrealistic,
impractical, and cuts at the root of basic commerce.
--
Steve