Is Big Data the New Big Brother? infographic by Kapitall.

The collection of data makes it easy for a computer to compile and spit out a thorough description of your life: hobbies, personal and professional interests, religious beliefs, family associations, and more. Big corporations can easily use this data to their advantage.

As highlighted in a New York Times article by Charles Duhigg, retailers often adjust the type of promotions you receive based on your purchase history, and predictive data around the timing and combination of those purchases.

The article featured Andrew Pole, a Target statistician helping the retail giant identify pregnant customers, even if those customers were trying to keep it secret. “Pole’s computers,” Duhigg writes, “are able to identify about 25 products that, when analyzed together, allowed him to assign each shopper a “pregnancy prediction” score. More important, he could also estimate her due date to within a small window, so Target could send coupons timed to very specific stages of her pregnancy.”

The post Infographic Friday: Is Big Data the New Big Brother? appeared first on Consumer Privacy USA.

The University of Maryland is sponsoring The Family, Privacy, Secrets & the Law roundtable on March 8. The conference will chart contemporary secrets and privacy issues that span genetic privacy, disclosure of parental identity in assisted reproduction cases and DNA conscription to domestic violence and child sexual abuse.

Michele Goodwin, a visiting professor at UM Carey Law who organized the conference, said, “There are times in which the law protects secrets, such as those between lawyer and client, doctor and patient, or clergy and congregant. Yet, there are times when the law demands that secret-keepers reveal their confidences, such as the increasing demand on doctors to disclose confidential medical information to law enforcement.”

The post When Family, Secrets and Privacy, and the Law Collide appeared first on Consumer Privacy USA.

More than 150 million Americans use Facebook, and 59.6 million households were active on Facebook in the past 12 months.

However, with more users comes more responsibility and concerns about Facebook privacy. How do Americans, specifically college students, feel about Facebook and other social networking sites? Some of these findings may surprise you.

The post Infographic Friday: Concerns that Face Facebook Users appeared first on Consumer Privacy USA.

WWII Security Poster

3M recently posted the results of a study they funded concerning visual privacy in the workplace. Are there any surprises in this study? Underneath their linkbait-ready headline, Study Reveals 50 Percent Loss in Productivity When Visual Privacy Is At Risk, there are actually some interesting findings. Not surprising is the pitch for 3M’s visual privacy screen products. And while the numbers are interesting, is this something new?

What does Van Eck and Scarlett Johansson have in common?

Ever worry about Van Eck phreaking? No, not a band appearing at SXSW. Van Eck phreaking is eavesdropping on the contents of a CRT or LCD screen. Publicized by a Dutch researcher in the mid 80s, it was just one security issue the US defense and intelligence community worried about. PCs were wrapped in a heavy shield called a Faraday cage to reduce electronic emissions. Keyboards were shielded. Even the room designs and equipment placement were part of the security program. There is an entire program, called TEMPEST, that set standards regarding emission security and Electromagnetic Compatibility (EMC). Visual privacy was a high-tech venture.

For most people and companies, electromagnetic leaking isn’t a concern. Chinese hackers do not need to sit outside your office with a big dish. Spying is much easier today – all you need is a bit of code, a zero-day exploit, and photos stolen from some actress’s smart phone.

But “leakage” in the form of someone reading over your shoulder, seeing screens they shouldn’t, and using their smart phone to snap photos of your screen while you go get you half-caff no-foam latte – that’s still a problem. In the 3M study, over half the respondents found this to be a problem.

Beyond the Boss Key – Visual Privacy and Productivity

Over-the-shoulder spying? Honestly, most people worry about getting caught on Facebook or playing a game. Nothing illustrates the need most people feel for visual privacy more than the proliferation of boss key software and panic button settings to use at work.

Visual privacy is more than about data security. Its also about workplace control. When new information technologies into workplace, management saw it as a way to monitor employee behavior more closely. As early as 1987, a US government report [The Electronic Supervisor ~ pdf] found that monitoring the quantity or speed of work contributes to stress and stress-related illness. Electronic monitoring was becoming just the first in a series of technologies: polygraph testing, drug testing, and genetic screening. Companies monitor to manage their enterprise, reduce costs, and reduce liability. Employees try preserve individual privacy and autonomy through technology, screening, and collaboration.

3M Sales Pitch – Why Visual Privacy Is Important

The five findings the research analysts found most important:

1. Employees are more productive and transparent when a 3M privacy filter is installed on their laptop or desktop computer.
2. Gender makes a difference. Female employees appear to work longer and harder than their male counterparts. The positive effect of the 3M privacy filter on employee productivity appears to be stronger for female versus male employees.
3. Age makes a difference. Employees between 26 and 35 years appear to work harder and longer than employees over 55 years. The positive effect of the 3M filter appears to be strongest for individuals at or below 35 years.
4. The impact of 3M privacy filters on employees’ productivity and transparency (or honesty of response) is related to their privacy orientation. The positive effect of the 3M privacy filter appears to be stronger for those who perceive privacy as very important or important to them.
5. Position seniority appears to impact the positive effect of the 3M privacy filter on employee productivity. Our results show that individuals at or above the supervisory level within their organizations are more productive than rank and file employees. In contrast, individuals below the supervisory level exhibit, on average, a higher level of transparency.

What Workplace Privacy Looks And Sounds Like

Screens alone can’t correct a poorly-designed work environment, no matter how useful they may be when you are editing that report in Starbucks.  In a 2011 blog post, Richard Fanelli, president of interior planning and commercial design firm Fanelli McClain, suggested that acoustic and visual privacy should be considered together in workplace design, and that flexibility was a key component:

Provide a variety of work environments with varying levels of acoustical and visual privacy that are unassigned, shared spaces. This especially works well in a space that has a wireless computer network so that you can bring your laptop with you. Years ago, Steelcase offered a 6’ by 8’ high-wall work pod called the Personal Harbor. You can create the same environment by creating small, closed offices with doors that have a work counter and sound-absorbing, acoustical wall surfaces that can be used for heads down work or sensitive phone calls. Sometimes these small rooms have frosted glass hinged or sliding doors so you can see if the room is occupied without having too clear a view that might create distraction.

Consider a sound masking system. Digital sound masking systems are usually located above the ceiling and create a hushing sound that masks the frequency level of the human voice. It makes nearby conversations unintelligible so that you can’t hear the specific words that are being spoken and turns those nearby conversations into general background noise. They are so sophisticated that they can be adjusted to mask predominantly male or female voices. They can be remotely controlled by a facilities manager. One best practice is to put them in both the open and closed areas so that you don’t notice the difference as you move from open to closed office space.

The Mandatory 3M Study Infographic

The post Is Visual Privacy A New Bottom-Line Workplace Issue? appeared first on Consumer Privacy USA.

After the previous post on Lulu, several readers posted suggestions on how to get out of Lulu, or other apps that misbehave like Lulu.  Here is a summary – let us know what works.  As part of testing, it looks like my own data got sucked into Lulu so I will let you know.

Information you will use on all of this:

Lulu’s legal address in the US:

Luluvise Inc
 2711 Centerville Road
 Suit 400
 Wilmington, Delaware 19808
 United States

Lulu’s DMCA/Privacy address

Luluvise Inc.
 100 Marine Parkway
 Suite 300
 Redwood City, CA 94065
 USA

onlulu.com  Legal Owners Address:

Luluvise Ltd
 33 Astley House
 Notting Hill Gate
 London, LONDON W11 3JQ
 United Kingdom

Additional Lulu info:

Email: privacy@luluvise.com
Phone (UK) +44.7966405671

Step 1 – Complain to Facebook

Anyone who has tried to complain to Facebook knows how challenging it can be — and how useless the answers usually are.  Except when they completely ignore it, like the comment we posted to their developer’s blog on Lulu’s violation of Facebook’s own policies.  But they do provide a postal address for privacy complaints – and as improbable as it may seem, postal records seem to attract more attention.  You can reclaim your privacy.

Go to http://graph.facebook.com/{your facebook name} and copy the name and id that appear.  This will be used for all your complaints.

Suggested text:

Mail it to: Facebook Inc., 1601 Willow Road, Menlo Park, CA 94025.  Send it certified mail if you really want their attention,

Step 2 – Complain to Amazon

Amazon?  Why Amazon?  Because Amazon is their hosting provider.

Send an email to: abuse@amazonaws.com

Step 3 – Complain to Lulu

Seriously?  Yes, actually.  They have a Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) process on their site a risk serious legal liability if they don’t respond with your request to at least remove your photo.  Since your photo was pulled from Facebook without your permission, they are violating your copyright (or the photographer’s copyright) of that photo [learn more about photos and the web].  If you KNOW your photo is on Lulu, go to their Terms and Conditions page and scroll aaallll the way down to “DMCA Notice of Alleged Infringement.”  Follow the instructions and provide all the requested information, using something like “since I am a guy, I am blocked from the site and cannot provide the URL of the link where such material may be found.  To locate this information, use my name and my Facebook ID: {name and Facebook ID}.”

Send this to their DMCA/Privacy address.  Also, send a copy of the DMCA letter, your Facebook complaint and your Amazon complaint to their legal Delaware address.

Step 4 – Bring in the Feds

Violating a site’s privacy statement and terms and conditions is actually something the FTC busts companies over.  The FTC can help you reclaim your privacy. They are handing out fines!  Making an FTC complaint is a bit time-consuming, but you’ve come this far and can do it all on-line.  Go to:

https://www.ftccomplaintassistant.gov/FTC_Wizard.aspx?Lang=en

After filling out your personal information:

1. select “Other” > “Internet” > “Other Internet Practices”
2. select “I have a complaint about my options (or lack of) for protecting my privacy on a website”
3. select “Yes” to “Do you know the name of the company/individual involved in your complaint, or do you have any other information about them?”
4. For the “Tell Us About The Company” use their Delaware address.  Then click “Add a Company” and add their California address.
5. Click through to your information and fill it in.  Then move on to the Additional Info screen.  Suggested text:

What If Lulu Doesn’t Like This?

Ah, those terms and conditions again. Lulu, like a lot of web sites who could actually care less about you as a person, trick you into agreeing to arbitration the minute you land on their page. They do this to limit their liability and to keep you from suing them. But this also means they can’t really do anything to you either. They would have to go to arbitration as well, and they would pay the costs.

So stand up for your privacy rights. Whatever they say, make ‘em say it to your face. Or at least buy you a drink first.

The post Guys, Want Out of Lulu? Reclaim Your Privacy In 4 Steps appeared first on Consumer Privacy USA.

We are five years away in New York from zero privacy.

The post The Surveillance Age – US to adopt new biometric surveillance system. appeared first on Consumer Privacy USA.

Several years ago, the SWIPE toolkit published a calculator you could use to estimate the true value of your information to data aggregators and resellers. The databases are a bit out of date now, but you can still get relevant prices for your little bits of personal data. The true value of this data may surprise you.

Back in November 2012, Pro Publica reported on companies responding to a congressional query on reselling data. In part, they found:

[The company] responses, released Thursday, show that some companies record — and then resell — your screen names, web site addresses, interests, hometown and professional history, and how many friends or followers you have.

Data companies of course, do not stop with the information on Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn. Intelius, which offers everything from a reverse phone number look up to an employee screening service, said it also collects information from Blogspot, WordPress, MySpace, and YouTube.

Online Privacy Issues Won’t Go Away – But We Might

Today [Feb 12 2013], the first article to show up in my Google Alerts (this fact is probably worth a penny or two alone) was “How to sacrifice your online privacy for fun and profit” in PC World. Going on the theory that everyone has a price:

But suppose that you wanted to grab a piece of the data-sharing action? Could you reap direct profit by voluntarily, brazenly giving away your data to the highest bidder? Though big data collection rankles privacy advocates, if you’re willing to play ball, you can share data on your own terms for fun and profit.

—–

The Bing Rewards program allows you rack up points for using Bing services, and while it’s probably more valuable to Microsoft as a means of luring away Google diehards, it unmistakably establishes a clear exchange system of private data for profit. Earn points by conducting Bing searches, sharing your Facebook account, and pimping Bing to your friends, and then cash those points in for rewards like a $5 Amazon gift card or a month’s subscription to the Xbox Music service (a $10 value). It’s hardly a get-rich-quick scheme—but given how little Google pays us in exchange for our traffic, I’ll take what I can get.

So why should data miners and aggregators pay for what many can get for free? Because we may be disappearing. Going on strike.

ReadWriteWeb took a look at a report on current trends in online behavior by market researcher Ovum.

What if two-thirds of the people on the Web were invisible, secretly visiting websites and searching for products and services while leaving Internet giants like Google and Facebook in the dark about what they were doing?

Signs exist today that the procession of media stories showing Internet companies compromising user privacy in favor of advertisers are having an impact on more and more people’s psyche.

Currently, most Internet business models assume easy, cheap access to user behavioral data and personal information. Sometimes its in exchange for a web service like search or social interaction. In his now famous remark in 2010, Mark Zuckerberg, co-founder and chief executive of Facebook, said “People have really gotten comfortable not only sharing more information and different kinds, but more openly and with more people” But he was wrong. Bad behavior and irresponsible custodianship of personal data has made the public wary of trusting companies with their privacy. An emerging industry of companies and services are empowering people to drop from view while they work and play online. When these tools become easy and understood, millions could vanish from the web.

“Internet companies need a new set of messages to change consumers’ attitudes,” said Ovum analyst Mark Little in announcing the new research. “These messages must be based on positive direct relationships, engagement with consumers, and the provision of genuine and trustworthy privacy controls.”

The post Online Privacy Issues – Get Paid or Get Lost appeared first on Consumer Privacy USA.

But what they’ve really done is simply update an old concept:

Old School

Graffiti on a Bathroom Wall /Alex Wright/CC BY-NC

New School

Lulu is essentially a virtual response to the old bathroom wall. By rather than simply dialing 867-5309 for a good time with Jenny and taking your chances, you can get a whole slew of ratings on a guy using the Lulu app. Everything from how often he pays for dinner to how wild he is in bed. Not to mention a bunch of personal information from Facebook a lot of guys may not want shared. And since they don’t know its been downloaded, this data is going to stay in Lulu’s database until Lulu merges, goes bankrupt, or gets sued.

NEW POST: Guys, Want Out of Lulu?  Reclaim Your Privacy In 4 Steps

That’s right guys – no peeking. If you come into work one day and the ladies are treating you strange – or your deeply religious boss decides to fire you for your moral turpitude, you may never know where the information came from.

Here is how it works. Once a lady logs signs in with Facebook, she is presented with a list of all her male friends, along with their profile photos, relationship status, etc:

Notice how much personal information is being grabbed – not just you, but all of your friends?  Once you log in, it grabs all the guys in your friends list. Cousin Ted. Kind Reverend Abernathy. Of course, how many women keep ex’s on their friend’s list? Or perhaps, what kind of women keeps all of her old flames on her friend’s list? I mean, aren’t a lot of them just somebody’s that you used to know?

Is Lulu Violating Facebook Privacy and Data Rules?

When you go through your list, all that personal data is dumped into Lulu’s database and shared with everyone else on Lulu. That seems to violate Facebook’s Data Use Policy:

If an application asks permission from someone else to access your information, the application will be allowed to use that information only in connection with the person that gave the permission and no one else.

Here’s the problem. Lulu promotes anonymity. But in their terms and conditions, they require you to get the permission from every person you rate. In other words, they are advertising one thing, then trying to cover their asses with making you legally responsible if the guy you upload decides he doesn’t like his personal data distributed around.

Lulu is the first ever app for private reviews of guys. When you meet a new dude, check his Lulu profile, and find out everything you want to know!

You are always anonymous on Lulu. Your privacy is our top priority! That’s why we never post to Facebook.

Find out the things you really want to know: is he ambitious, trustworthy, good in bed?

Then vote on reviews and add to the collective wisdom!

But according to their terms and conditions:

You acknowledge that uploading or posting information about other individuals might encroach on the data protection rights of those individuals. Accordingly, Members who upload photographs or information about other individuals should do so only with the express consent from the individual who is the subject of the photograph or information.

You acknowledge and agree that you are solely responsible for all Member Content that you make available…[does not]…violate a third party’s copyright…or rights of publicity or privacy

And how anonymous are the female users? Not really at all. Again:

Luluvise cooperates with government and law enforcement officials and private parties to enforce and comply with the law. We may disclose any information about you to government or law enforcement officials or private parties as we, in our sole discretion, believe necessary or appropriate to respond to claims and legal process (including but not limited to subpoenas and Court Orders), to protect the property and rights of Luluvise or a third party, to protect the safety of the public or any person, or to prevent or stop activity we may consider to be, or to pose a risk of being, illegal, unethical or legally actionable activity… Luluvise may sell, transfer or otherwise share some or all of its assets, including your Personal Information, in connection with a merger, acquisition, reorganization or sale of assets or in the event of bankruptcy.

Someone sues Lulu because of information you post? They can role on you and hand all your data over whenever they want. If they go belly up or get acquired, and your data – your reviews, your friends, your personal information – goes to the highest bidder.

What does the founder know, and when did she know it?

In a recent Buzzfeed article, founder Alexandra Chong claimed that:

She’s also noticed men bragging about their good Lulu reviews on Twitter. And men can remove themselves if they don’t like what they see.

WTF? I thought that no guys were allowed. And no, guys can’t remove themselves from the database.  In fact, women can’t either – unless they send Lulu a physical letter requesting their data be removed.  Simply removing the app does not remove anything from Lulu’s database – including the Facebook friend data you imported.  Remember, you can’t register if you’re a ‘dude’ – but the article shares the following tweet:

Not sure, but they should have carded him. On the other hand, after checking his YouTube channel, I’m not sure he’s old enough have a driver’s license yet. Perhaps he knows Ashley R:

Isn’t it Libel or Defamation or Privacy Protection Something?

Ever wonder how sites like RateMyProfessor, Yelp, website forums, and even blogs like this seem to be immune to lawsuits over contributed content? That’s because of Section 230 of Communications Decency Act (CDA) of 1996:

No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider

So if someone posts a comment that defame you – I’m not responsible. The comment writer is. Go sue him.

However, protection is not absolute. Since Lulu is collecting the data from Facebook, aggregating it, guiding the users through canned questions, and basing content recommendations based on an algorithm, it could be argued that Lulu is a content provider and has lost CDA protection. Of course, the whole CDA thing is why Lulu is legally operating in the USA.

Who is Luluvise?

They actually operate out of London. Because of strict EU and UK privacy and libel laws, they set up a Delaware corporation-in-a-box via CSC. They claim that the legal jurisdiction for the site is in California. However, outside of a legal address for DMCA take-down notices, they seem to have no legal presence in the state. A search on the California Secretary of State’s website returns zilch, so they haven’t provided the proper filings they are supposed to in order to conduct business in California. Their data is on Amazon. They may have legal representation in California, and they have a paper corporation in secretive Delaware. Their development and technical team appears to be in London.

Administrative Contact:
Chong, Alexandra accounts@luluvise.com
Luluvise
144A Clerkenwell Road
London, LONDON EC1R 5DF
United Kingdom
0-795-142-2840

Of course your private personal data is safe. They say it is in their privacy policy.

Forget Privacy and Fair Play. Is A Girls Only App Legal?

Can you actually have a girls-only app? Not sure. Recent trends around ADA lawsuits seem to be identifying websites as “places of public accommodation.” Many states, such as California and Colorado, protect access to public accommodations based on sexual orientation and gender identity. One could even argue the reviews would be even more valuable if they included ALL the partners that a potential boyfriend has had, not just the female ones. eHarmony had to settle several lawsuits for not treating gay and lesbian dating on an equal footing as straight dating. At the very least, they may want to rethink having California as their venue. Perhaps Mississippi would be a better choice.

Lulu – Yes, We Are Talking About You

We have an app distributed through Google and Apple that violates its own terms and conditions and sucks up and stores data about guys without their permission for long-term storage.  It probably breaks privacy rules, discrimination laws, and accepted social contracts. It then guides their female-only user base through brutally honest evaluations that are public in one sense (other women, like the guy’s boss, coworkers, mother, crazy ex’s), but inaccessible to the victim person they are targeting discussing. Their founder is misinformed about its functionality and brags about how it affects the egos of underage users.

I would like to hear other opinions.  Even though I’m a guy.

The post Lulu – Review Guys, Violate Privacy, Have a Cosmopolitan appeared first on Consumer Privacy USA.

Microsoft is questioning other Google practices. For example, they point out that in May 2012 Google Shopping results are now all paid ads. Microsoft is also sponsoring a petition drive to tell Google to stop scanning user email accounts to target ads.

Microsoft commissioned a recent survy on email services practices. Seven out of ten users were unaware Google scanned the content of emails in order to deliver targeted ads. “Emails are personal — and people feel that reading through their emails to sell ads is out of bounds,” says Stefan Weitz , senior director of Online Services at Microsoft. “We honor the privacy of our Outlook.com users, and we are concerned that Google violates that privacy every time an Outlook.com user exchanges messages with someone on Gmail. This campaign is as much about protecting Outlook.com users from Gmail as it is about making sure Gmail users know what Google’s doing.”

Microsoft, in contrast, scans e-mails only for viruses, or to mark them as spam. Outlook.com ads are based on the web sites users visit, age, zip code and gender. Not quite as intrusive – the difference between peeking through your blinds or hiding in your closet. But for $19.95 a year, Microsoft will at least go away and leave your mailbox ad-free.

The post Do you feel Scroogled? appeared first on Consumer Privacy USA.

by Lois Beckett – ProPublica, Feb. 5, 2013, 7 a.m.

For years, state Democratic parties have been gathering information about individual voters’ political leanings. They have noted down the opinions voters shared with canvassers — which candidates they said they supported or their positions on policy issues.

Now, the record of what people told Democratic volunteers may go up for sale — and not just to political groups. Democrats are looking into whether credit card companies, retailers like Target or other commercial interests may want to buy the information.

State Democratic party leaders formed the National Voter File Co-op in 2011 to sell their voter data to approved groups like the NAACP. The goal was to recoup some of the money local Democratic parties spent collecting and updating their local voter lists, which include voters of all parties.

Much of the data the co-op sells comes from the government and is already part of the public record — information such as voters’ names, addresses and party affiliation.

But local Democratic parties also have information about voters’ views and preferences collected over many campaign cycles. (We wrote about Minnesota’s data-collecting “Grandma Brigade” last month.) Some state Democratic parties have used this raw data to create sophisticated estimates of how likely any voter is to vote for a Democrat, support Barack Obama or have certain opinions, say, on abortion or gun control.

As the co-op moves into its second year of selling data in an already crowded marketplace, it’s looking for new potential clients — and companies who may use the data for commercial purposes, as opposed to political ones, are on the list.

“That’s one of our growth areas,” said Drew Brighton of TargetSmart Communications, which helps administer and market the Co-op’s data. “Over the next six months, we are going to go ahead and make the rounds with some corporate prospects.”

Brighton said retailers, for example, might be interested in figuring out if their customers are primarily Democrats or Republicans. “People want to know who shops in their stores,” he said.

Democrats involved with the co-op do not know what companies might be most interested in buying their voter data.

“What the co-op is doing is saying, ‘Look, there’s a wealth of information here, that could potentially benefit your corporation or your business interests,’” said Ken Martin, a member of the co-op’s board, and the chairman of Minnesota’s Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party.

“Everything is on the table, nothing’s off the table. It’s up to us to figure out what [data] there’s a market for, and whether there’s a comfort level among state parties for selling that information,” he said.

Each state Democratic Party will have the final say over whether to sell their voter information for commercial purposes. If state party leaders aren’t comfortable with selling proprietary data to a certain client, they can opt out.

Individual states have different laws about how their public voting records can be used. Many states mandate that public voter rolls can only be used for “political purposes,” and some states explicitly ban using voting records for “commercial purposes.” The co-op and its clients must abide by these rules.

But state political data laws do not apply to the information about voters that the party itself has gathered.

“Generally, information freely provided to the party by the voter, or data about who participated in a primary [that the party collects] is not subject to any prohibition on it being sold,” said Karl Sandstrom, a former vice-chairman of the Federal Elections Commission and an attorney for the co-op.

This means Democrats are free to sell the opinions voters give to campaign canvassers to credit card companies or marketing firms.

Whether they will choose to do this isn’t certain. Martin, the Minnesota Democratic chairman, said that party leaders will have to weigh the risks of any potential deal.

“Obviously, we know we could make money off our file, but it always comes back to the question of, at what cost?” Martin said.

He said he would evaluate commercial deals on a case-by-case basis.

“I’m not opposed to selling the data if it’s a corporation who shares our values and is going to do some good work with that data.”

Wal-Mart, for instance, would not make the cut, he said.

Whether corporations are interested in buying the co-op’s data remains to be seen. Wal-Mart did not respond to a request for comment about whether it would be interested in buying information about its customers’ political beliefs.

Consumer data companies like Experian already peddle information about individuals’ political beliefs and donation histories — and also link this information to their consumer habits. This November, Experian Simmons released a study breaking down the political leanings of shoppers at J. Crew, Lady Foot Locker, and more than 100 other major retailers.

But the fact that selling voters’ opinions to companies is even an option for Democrats is another example of how rapidly the data industry is evolving — and how little information individuals have about how their data is being shared.

In his “Consumer Privacy Bill of Rights,” released last year, President Barack Obama argued that when companies collect personal data from consumers, they should only share it in ways consumers expect.

If a company decides it wants to share personal information in a new way, Obama suggested, it should notify the consumers who are affected and provide them with choices about how their data is used.

Although Obama pledged to work with Congress to make the Consumer Privacy Bill of Rights into law, that hasn’t happened yet.

Joseph Turow, a privacy expert at the University of Pennsylvania’s Annenberg School for Communication, said the possibility that Democrats might repurpose voters’ opinions for commercial marketing is problematic — particularly because they had collected that information through “a relationship of trust” with voters.

Both Democrats and Republicans have long traded information about voters’ opinions with outside political groups. Long-time Republican activists have created a new group, the Data Trust, to manage the Republican National Committee’s data and coordinate data exchanges between the RNC and conservative and issue advocacy groups.

Asked if the Republican Party sells the party’s proprietary data to retailers or credit card companies, RNC spokeswoman Kirsten Kukowsi wrote, “Absolutely not — hasn’t happened in past and won’t in [the] future.”

The Obama campaign’s own closely guarded trove of voter information will be used to mobilize support for the president’s agenda through a new nonprofit advocacy group, Organizing for Action, led by top Obama aides.

It’s not clear what other groups may be given access to Obama’s voter data. Organizing for Action did not respond to a request for comment. Staffers have said that passing on the campaign’s voter information to an Obama-focused nonprofit reflects the wishes of the president’s supporters, although supporters were not asked directly about how the campaign should treat their data.

Sandstrom, the lawyer for the state Democratic parties’ National Voter File Co-op, said he doubted the co-op would actually end up selling voters’ opinions for commercial uses, calling it an “abstract concern.”

Democratic Party chairs were not eager to weigh in on the issue.

Last week, ProPublica contacted 11 Democratic state party chairs — some of them newly elected to their positions — about the National Voter File Co-op. Party chairs in Colorado, Florida, Iowa, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Maryland, North Carolina, Nevada, Utah, Virginia and Wisconsin declined or did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

New Hampshire Democratic chair Ray Buckley, who leads the Association of State Democratic Chairs, also declined to comment.

The post Will Democrats Sell Your Political Opinions to Credit Card Companies? appeared first on Consumer Privacy USA.