• Junk Mail "Spies"

    From Steve Asher@3:800/432 to All on Tuesday, May 23, 2006 15:42:24

    Last Update: Tuesday, May 23, 2006. 2:37pm (AEST)
    Junk mail deliverers to 'spy' on households

    An Australian marketing company is planning to use its network of
    catalogue deliverers to collect information about households that
    will be sold to advertisers.

    PMP is giving its walkers global positioning tracking technology, with
    the eventual aim of having them feed back information such as whether
    fences need painting, and which neighbourhoods have high numbers of
    children or pets.

    "We would be saying to our walkers in time - not today, but in time
    - that obviously they would be able to collect data for us as they
    walk around the neighbourhood," PMP chief executive Brian Evans said.

    "So we could say in a particular suburb there are more houses needing
    painting than others, we could say to advertisers: 'Look this is a
    prime area for you to look at'."

    Mr Evans says the company is not planning to collect personal
    information, such as the details of what people are hanging on
    their clothes lines.

    "We're not talking about looking at anything personal at all ...
    it's just gathering some basic data that says this is a good area
    for promotion for dog food, for instance," he said.

    Privacy fears

    The Australian Privacy Foundation is worried by the development.

    [...]

    http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200605/s1645382.htm


    Cheers, Steve..

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    * Origin: Xaragmata / Adelaide SA telnet://xaragmata.thebbs.org (3:800/432)