Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!cunixf.cc.columbia.edu!cs.columbia.edu!abrams From: abrams@cs.columbia.edu (Steven Abrams) Newsgroups: comp.org.eff.talk Subject: Re: Post Office plans to sell address databases. Message-ID: Date: 14 Dec 90 14:46:33 GMT References: <12972@milton.u.washington.edu> Sender: news@cs.columbia.edu (The Daily News) Distribution: comp Organization: Columbia University Department of Computer Science Lines: 77 In-Reply-To: cyberoid@milton.u.washington.edu's message of 14 Dec 90 01:09:42 GMT In article <12972@milton.u.washington.edu> cyberoid@milton.u.washington.edu (Robert Jacobson) writes: >Today's WALL STREET JOURNAL carries an alarming story about U.S. Post >Office plans to begin selling a national address directory. At first, >only addresses will be available. However, there are plans afoot to >add names at some later date. I am missing part of the big problem here. The phone company has been making money with a "database" of phone numbers on a regional basis for years. In fact, it costs you money to be left out of their database. Are we, the supporters of the electronic frontier, the age of information, etc..., now saying that it is OK to distribute databases in printed form but not in machine-readable form? This particular situation, IMHO, is very different from that piece of garbage Lotus is selling. Here, we're talking about a list of addresses and names -- not dossiers or buying habits. If the phone companies suddenly began selling jointly a CD-ROM of all listed telephone numbers, addresses, and names, would you then complain? But I have a hypothetical question for you all... Several years ago, (at least 10..), the NY local NBC affiliate ran a special report on living in a fishbowl. My uncle was the news manager of the station at the time and was the only one willing to volunteer as a "test" to a Private I. they interviewed. The PI wanted to show how much information he could obtain about someone, given only a name and city, without leaving his desk. He obtained, in 24 hours, his address, all lease information on the apartment, salary, employment history, high school/college, where he grew up, where he shopped, family information, credit history, etc., etc... (The PI cheated and talked to my uncle's doorman for about 10 minutes). This was obviously in the pre marketing database days. This guy broke no laws. He just asked the right questions to the right people. So information has always been available. Anyone who ever wanted to know anything about anyone could find it out. It's scary, but true. The worst part about this was that if someone obtained false information through these pseudo-clandestine means, there could be serious consequences (depending of course upon what the information was used for). But no one would be held accountable for it. So now, some company wants to put all the information they can find on a big disk and make it available at a cost to the rest of the business world. If they are providing this information, and they are held accountable for its accuracy, and any individual can remove him or herself from the database, is this better? Is it worse? Does it make any difference? Are we, the pioneers of the electronic frontier afraid of the technology we support? Proper legal steps (many of which have been discussed here) need to be taken to make sure that all sides can benefit and be protected, but the development of "marketing databases" was inevitable. Finally, what is the difference between information in machine readable and human readable form as far as these discussions go? Does the fact that the info is in a more useable form change the legal implications of distributing the data? I think not. Just some fuel for the fire... ***Anti-flame clarification: This posting does NOT reflect support for Lotus or their marketing database. I DO support legislative steps required to protect those in "public" databases, although I'm not sure to what extent. ~~~Steve -- /************************************************* * *Steven Abrams abrams@cs.columbia.edu * **************************************************/ #include #include