Friday, June 27, 2008

ISPs Want You

We live in the age of electronic tracking. That's the reality of the world. Any time you step onto the information superhighway (yeah, I still love that term) rest assured there is a super cop sitting somewhere that knows exactly what you're doing.

Sleep well.

Despite knowing that our footsteps never truly go away, it's still disconcerting to have corporations blatantly tell you that they want to track you -- for your own good. It's even more disconcerting when it's the very companies that give you the entry ramp to the Web (I'm going to keep carrying this metaphor out).

Two cable companies continue to insist on rolling out a test to track users in order to provide more targeted service, so they say.

Which makes sense if their business is delivering advertising. We voluntarily allow websites to use cookies, little bits of code that give you an anonymous identity on a site, so that we don't continually have to re-input our username and password, for instance.

The cable company, though, shouldn't have reason for that tracking. They are a conduit for data services: Internet, cable television and voice. What I do and where I go should be of no interest to them.

None.

I don't want them listening to my phone conversation (FISA aside, that is) so I sure as heck don't want them watching the sites I visit.

But we live in the age of surveillance.

Posted By Brad at 12:57 PM
Permanent Link: ISPs Want You | Comments (2)

(2) Comments on ISPs Want You

It isn't the surveillance so much that disturbs me -- just walking and talking on the street many people can 'see you'. What bothers me more is the _interpretation_ of what they may THINK I am doing versus what I am intending to do. It's a vicious circle. They know more and more about less and less until they know everything about nothing. Scary.

Comments by James Thomas : Friday, July 04, 2008 at 12:36 AM

Hey James, thanks for reading and commenting.

I agree that it's not the idea that it's happening -- it's been happening for years -- it's the extrapolations they make, as if there can be only one interpretation -- THEIRS -- as the reason behind the data.

Good post.

Comments by Brad King : Friday, July 04, 2008 at 02:54 PM

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