You are giving off a lot of personal information online. Signing up may ask for your name, zip code, among other info, but big software companies such as Microsoft know more information thank you think they do. For example, they know exactly when you check your inbox, and the average monthly income of your neighborhood. Indeed, these companies aggregate and collect data in very complex ways using complicated tools that record user online behavior merged with other data. Many users are unaware that these companies know so much about them. This is the summary of an article by Michelle Kessler and Byron Acohido, which talks about targeting behavior and mining for online user data. You can get the pdf of the behavioral targeting article here: Data miners dig a little deeper
Behavioral targeting
Behavioral targeting is the main technique for this agendum. Companies like Yahoo observe online behavior of their users, know what they are most likely to buy, and create targeted ads that they sell to advertisers. This is also done by online retailers through cookies, which keeps track of the websites you browse. Behavioral targeting is growing, and online advertising companies are making it their top priority. They point out advantages for both consumer and advertiser. For the latter, they can charge higher for reduced annoyances and more relevant ads. For the former, a user will be pleased to find out advertisers know exactly what he/she needs.
Loyalty cards
Brick-and-mortar companies are doing the same thing through loyalty cards. For exchange of personal information, users get discounts. Catalina, a company that collects the data from 20,000 stores, analyzes the data and creates a portrait of the shoppers, which gets more accurate over time. To date, loyalty cards are growing rapidly, ensuing concern among privacy enthusiasts.
Data-mining
This spawned a new industry called data-mining. Data-mining software is basically used to analyze massive amount of data to help companies figure out which set-ups work best for their company. But as technology progresses, data-mining is becoming more complex. For example, some software take personal records and compare it with thousands of others, looking for any kind of relationship. This method is implemented in Las Vegas Casinos.
Trust: a main issue
Data-mining technology has raised eyebrows as privacy violation is inevitable for all of these used data without permission. Several scientists have attempted to create tools that would limit databases ability to extract personal information. Others suggest proper disclosure; one should limit sharing information to companies one doesn’t trust, and share only personal information to those one trusts.
Trust is a main issue, and these companies claim that they are highly responsible for these data, imposing bans and regulations. However, some consumers aren’t confident. They are wary about what these large companies can manipulate users to doing in the future, as they manipulate us into buying certain products now.