>At 05:11 PM 2/20/00 -0500, Petro wrote:
>> You're brighter than that DCF. If, say, 20 years from now
>>Insurance Companies get legal access to your shopping records that
>>Mega-Chain-Food stores have, and they find out that you've been
>>buying shrimp weekly, and that shrimp is proven to be a link to
>>Alzheimers disease, so they deny your policy (or simply ammend to to
>>cut out treatment for Alzhemiers).
>
>Surely you don't argue with a private entity's obligation
>to research its risks? If they ask about your drinking,
>smoking, or shrimping behaviors, it would be fraud to deceive,
>voiding any contract, no?
>
>The issue here is, what is the privacy expected of your
>purchasing data? The market could implement various
>controls: customers would only use e.g., credit cards or grocery stores
>which promised not to share data. This could be part of the contract you
>sign when you give ID to a credit card co.
No, the question, at least as I remember it was something
along the lines of "So what if they collect the data, what's the big
deal with databases".
I am not advocating laws against collection of data--that is
within a businesses right (or rather the rights of the people running
the business). What I am/would argue against is a law that forces you
to give your real name, as well as the attitude that these data
collections are harmless.
--
A quote from Petro's Archives: **********************************************
If the courts started interpreting the Second Amendment the way they interpret
the First, we'd have a right to bear nuclear arms by now.--Ann Coulter
