Not So Personal Information
Posted on March 18, 2008 - Filed Under Got Me Thinking, Privacy, Vent
My credit card has most likely been compromised yet again. It is not the first time. TGH and I have had to have new cards issued in the past because of a security breach at TJX companies. These incidents really get me angry. I wonder how it happens and although they always seem to know that nothing other than the credit card numbers have been accessed, it truly makes me wonder. It gets me thinking.
It is my opinion that Americans are way too liberal with their personal information. Sure, we shred our documents every so often. I mean, wasn’t a personal shredder the perfect gift at Christmas just a few years ago? Some of us have gone so far as to have a different number assigned to our driver’s license because we don’t want our Social Security Numbers on there.
Yet, we give our phone number to the cashier, and our Social Security Numbers to any potential employer or creditor. How many times does your license get taken from you and had a copy made to be kept on file so you can join a group such as a gym or food wholesale club? The pharmacy and the supermarket both have little cards to put on your keychain so you can enjoy “extra savings.”
Ever wonder what those extra savings were costing you? They store information about your purchases so they can market more things to you (and everyone else). Some supermarkets and pharmacies don’t even have regular sales anymore. To get a lower price you have to have their card. To get their card, you must fill out a form providing personal information such as your name, address, phone number etc. We are giving up some privacy so they can make more money. Before credit cards, you only had to fork over some of the green and none of your personal information.
I just wonder when does it all stop? How much is too much? I personally feel that my information is on a need to know basis. Even my image or my likeness is not something that needs to be on file.
My gym just got a new camera on their computer so they can take pictures of the members to keep on file. For security reasons, they say. It actually puts a security breach on my information. Now if someone breaks into their machine, they get my likeness, my credit card number that I needed to provide to join the gym, plus the name, address, and phone information that is pretty standardly asked for whenever you join anything these days. So if someone breaks into their computer system at any location in the world where this gym happens to have a franchise, they can call me, stalk me, steal my identity, you name it.
The way I see it is that the more places my information is, then the more likely it is that it will get stolen or abused by someone. I need to protect that information as much as I possibly can. And also, just because we have a certain technology, I don’t think we necessarily need to use it (think nuclear bomb or chemical weapon). So I’m sorry if the gym spent money and bought a new little camera for on top of their computer, but that doesn’t mean I give them the right to take my picture and store it in on their machine. I never agreed to that when I signed up. But now that I think of it, maybe I should be getting the photos of all the workers at the gym and their personal information in return for allowing them access to mine. That should definitely make it less tempting for anyone to misuse it, don’t you think? Fair is fair.
Even your employer is not necessarily going to safeguard your information the way you would. They claim everything is stored on a separate, isolated hard drive. Sure it is. But how many contractors and temps do they employ who haven’t gone through the same background checks and fingerprinting/drug testing that they’ve put YOU, the regular employee, through? And how many times are innocent human errors made? I worked at one company where I found all of our Social Security Numbers were out on the intranet. This intranet was connecting 4,000 employees at different locations in the country. Did I know and trust them all? I worked there for ten years and no, I didn’t know and trust them all. I didn’t even trust all the ones I knew! So I did the natural thing. I looked up the President of the company’s Social Security Number and emailed it to him, asking if he knew that any of the 4,000 employees could access it and hoping he was on good terms with all of them. 
He wasn’t too happy about that and that situation was remedied in a reasonable amount of time. However, this company didn’t really learn a lesson as they still used the last four digits of employee’s Social Security Numbers for the local area network IDs. And this was totally gratuitous since every employee had a unique employee ID number that could have been used instead. They remedied a situation in which they may have become liable if that information had been misused (turns out there were a lot of legal issues with the Social Security Numbers being out on the intranet) but they still didn’t care about protecting the employee’s information, it seems or they also would have changed those LAN IDs.
So I’ve been thinking about these things a lot and my conclusion is that we have to do everything we can to protect our information ourselves because nobody else does. I know it sometimes seems harmless when places request all this information and it doesn’t seem like too much trouble to provide it, but really, when things go awry, isn’t it worth it to try and protect your information in the first place than to have to go through all the time, effort, and hassle or trying to repair things after the fact? I’ve heard of people who have spent up to eight years straightening out their financial records and credit after having their identity stolen. Yikes. Who needs to be dealing with that? Life is busy enough.
Do I take things like this a little too seriously? Maybe, but somebody has to. Because who else is going to protect your information better than you? And I think if we stop providing it so readily, we can maybe protect some of our information and reduce the likelihood of having our identities stolen or having our information compromised. I especially think it is important in this high-tech age and hopefully we can make a difference before all of our medical information gets treated the same way and becomes just as easy a target.
Also, I always feel I’m losing a bit of myself each time I walk away from having to shell out so much personal information. I don’t like having to trust so many people with it. Please feel free to Stumble this post, Digg it, or whatever. I’d like to hear that I’m not alone in being concerned about this type of thing.
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17 Responses to “Not So Personal Information”
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Oops, I tripped. Must have stumbled.
Thanks Witchypoo! You are awesome, no matter what ABB says about you!
Teeni, you are so right. I think I often don’t think twice about giving out my name and address… I will now though. I also recently had my credit card number compromised… whatever that means… they issued me a new card and that’s that. No explanation. Nothing.
This high tech world is called progress but I think that might be an oxymoron.
You just made me think of something else - when your info gets compromised it could affect your whole family and your kids’ safety. I’m not saying this to scare anyone, but really it is true when you think about it. Yikes.
I totally agree! Nathan’s info was stolen by a health insurance company employee. We put fraud alerts on our credit report now.
Keeping an eye on your identity is a huge deal and everyone needs to take steps to protect themselves!
Well said!
Great post, great points. The concerns are all too real. I tend to be one of those people that doesn’t like to worry until there’s something to worry about, but I really need to rethink that philosophy.
Thank you for shedding a little light on this subject. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have documents to shred.
LOL. Thanks for the compliments and welcome to the Vaguetarian Tea Room, Peter! I just think we all can do more to protect ourselves. And I think there must be better/safer ways for companies to serve us without keeping all of that personal information in files all over the place. Now I’ve got to go do some shredding myself!
I agree, Teeni. My gym just did the same thing (got a camera and asked to take our pictures). I wasn’t happy about it.
My credit card number has had to be changed twice in the short time I’ve had it (9 years I think) because somebody else had attempted to use it to purchase things. My bank is ONTO IT because both times they called me less than an hour after “suspicious” activity was reported, and cancelled my card immediately. I hate to think what would have happened if they didn’t do a good job with monitoring it!
It irks me that so many stores are now asking for phone numbers and/or email addresses when I purchase something. I assume they want to have a database containing purchases each customer has made … but why??? Why do they need to know who bought what? For refunds? Keep the reciept & tags, I say! For marketing? We get bombarded with stuff anyway. There are companies who SELL information about people to business so they can spam their email inbox or physical mailbox with crap. That’s just a fact of life, unfortunately.
It definitely is important to protect our own information, but the question is, how? I can only see the situation getting worse. I can see implantable microchips in people’s arms which are used to store huge amounts of data and even pay for things. This is not good. I will not be happy about that kind of “technological advancement”. So I guess we just wait … and try and be sensible … and hope/pray that our identity stays safe.
That’s exactly the type of future I’m afraid of - microchips in arms, medical records in there too, possibly! And think about it - if that is the way things go then will we be literally risking our arms and legs (or wherever the microchip is) when someone wants to get at that information? You hear about people having digits chopped off so the thief can steal the victim’s rings. Is it such a far stretch to think that those type of minds wouldn’t also chop off your arm to get your personal information? I know that seems extreme but I can certainly see something like that being possible. EEk!
I have never had my credit card compromised, but I did have a scare awhile back when I sent for a information packet from ebay. When I got the so called information it was all a bunch of adds, so I tossed it. I didnt know it, but somewhere in that pack it supposedly said if they didnt hear from me they would take $100 out of my checking account every month for this service that all I had ask was information about! We caught it fairly fast, but boy am I careful now!!
Wow - that was sneaky of them. I doubt they would have had a legal leg to stand on to charge you but it’s hard/time-consuming to get the money back once it is gone. Glad you caught it!
Scary stuff Teeni, thanks for making me think about this. I can be a little blindly trusting sometimes
Yeah, my bloggy buddies are all way too nice and I don’t ever want any of these bad things to happen to any of you so I hope it helps.
Wow, Teeni. Love the rant. Love all the info that you shared with us .. It definitely makes one think of how many people really do come into contact with personal information. And that is SCARY.
I’ve had my identity stolen, and my bank account drained, so I know how it feels to be violated in that sense. It’s terrible, to say the least.
Is your Meez doing a little dance? Or does she have a wedgie?
It really IS scary stuff. Lots more people than you think can get/have access to it. I remember thinking of all the IT people who were upgrading the hospital software who saw my records because they had to sit beside the hospital workers to train them. That bothered me a bit because I knew nothing about them and what kind of backgrounds/respect for other people’s privacy they had. Oh, my Meez has a magnifying glass and is looking for your personal data! Look out!! If she finds it, she and I are going shopping! LOL
Some tips/info:
- Use credit cards over debit or bank cards - Credit cards usually offer some protection where if they get access to your bank account it is real money that isn’t protected. Just pay off what you charge.
- You can always say you have an unlisted number when a store asks.
- All of the supermarket cards, asking for phone numbers, accounts at Amazon, etc. are done so they can profile what people buy for targeted marketing. When you checkout, you might can a coupon for cat food if you are buying it, but the dog owners get dog food coupons. They also see what things you buy together. For example, Super Bowl is coming and people buy chips and soda, so let’s put them in a single display and run a promotion. There are powerful data mining applications that look for patterns and the more info they have on you, the more they know about how best to market to you.
These are good tips, TGH. You are a smart man and that is why I married you!
Oh I know just how you feel - it is all so alarming. Of course the British Govt is now on about producing ID cards for us all. Not something that inspires us mel with confidence. Many Govt depts have lost so much personal information by sending and then losing data discs in the mail system. They also assign personal information to the wrong people sometimes so it is not very accurate and is then very time consuming to get corrected. Once something is in a computer system ‘they’ believe it is infallible and forget that the input is typed in by a rushied imperfect human. The whole world appears to be run by semi literate and thoughtless idiots - I have no faith in anyone to protect my security or safety.
Maybe we should go for unlisted telephone numbers, ditch the mobile phones, ditch card transactions return to cash and avoid the internet until we have privacy and cookie less surfing…
Good points you’ve raised teeni….. power to the people ..
Oh, that is so true - once it is in the computer - whether correct or not, they do believe it is infallible. It seems to take Herculean efforts to remedy these things sometimes. LOL. My phone is already private and I am considering going back to cash. I need to step up deleting my cookies though.
It is all very sobering, that’s for sure.
I would eat my cookies-not delete them!
Hmm - me too if they were chocolate chip walnut cookies. Yum!
Oh no, this is horrible, I’m so sorry that you had to endure this… My family has had awful luck with identity theft too, ever since my sister’s ex decided to purchase a new car in her name, total it within a week, and run for the hills… Her credit is still recovering, and he still hasn’t paid up. It really is miserable, and all of those anti-fraud programs are worth the investment, trust me!
It really can be devastating! Thanks for commenting and sharing that info. I feel for your sister - nobody deserves that, but I’m glad to hear your opinion on the anti-fraud programs.
Great post as usual Teeni. Very scary. I always wondered WHY they ask for my number at Toys R Us. WHATS IT TO YA! Very bizarre. It almost feels like a conspiracy! They are gathering, and gathering, and we are walking around so un-aware. Then, BLAM, one day - we’ll all be corn holed
I understand when they ask for a zip code - that makes sense as it might help them determine where to locate a future store and zip codes aren’t as personally identifying as other information. But they really don’t need the other information to do business, as far as I’m concerned.
Oh Blimey! So sorry to hear that Teeni (((HUGS)))
I have my own stance on the debit card thing. I won’t give any information to anyone unless it’s absolutely vital. I think the more security measures we put in place, the worse the situation gets. As you say, sharing the info makes it more available. Here, in the UK, John and myself deal in cash only.
When I visited the US, I found it hard to do anything without a card - debit or otherwise. I found it really difficult.
I have one card and I only use it for on-line stuff and it has a minimal amount in the account so if I am fleeced, they can’t take much. But more and more companies are not willing to accept cash off line. It’s a shame, it really is.
It shouldn’t be like this, should it? Companies should be able to handle themselves much better than this shouldn’t they?
I definitely think there have got to be better ways. The best way to keep info secure is to not have it all out there. Every identity you do business with doesn’t NEED to have your home address, telephone number, credit situation, marital status, annual income, etc. Except in obvious situations like applying for a loan, they may want to see past credit - that is understandable. But I think too many of these places just want to have a profile of each person they do business with. I don’t want to be in every company’s computer who I interact with.
Wow this was a really informative post, and to be honest, I feel so scatter-brained all the time, that I don’t really question all those personal info requests, but I think it’s time to take a step back…
PS: last week I saw some headline that Google is going to start making medical records available on the Internet for patients to access???? I hope that was a hallucination….
I didn’t see that particular headline but it doesn’t surprise me as it seems that is the general direction we’ve been heading in. It didn’t surprise me, but it still terrifies me. All I can say is BAD idea. We can’t even keep credit card info safe yet. Again, BAD idea.
ouch! that sucks about your personal info being comprimised.
Maybe i should be more careful with my info, but i’m just not. It always amazes me when people tell me that they will simply NOT buy anything over the internet because they dont want to give out their credit card info, but at the same time think nothing of going to a store, having their card swiped and the carbons just thrown into a trashcan. Seems much less safe to me.
And if you arent down with showing your picture publicly (which is certainly understandable), then you probably DONT want to check out my blog today ….
You are too funny. How can I resist going to see what you’ve posted now? I can’t take the curiosity, you know!
This is a great post Teeni! It is quite easy to steal someone’s identity, and some situations are much worse than others. I strongly suggest you read “The Art of Deception” by Kevin Mitnick. This is the bible on ’social engineering’. If you would like a free PDF version of the book, I will send it to you. However, it’s well worth buying and will show you much about how your information is actually stolen. Believe it or not, mush of it is done through a series of phone calls, where the criminal imitates other people, including yourself.
I don’t use credit cards - I pay cash only. Sorry to hear about your problem, but understanding how it’s done is the best defense