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From: gast@lanai.cs.ucla.edu (David Gast)
Newsgroups: comp.org.eff.talk
Subject: Re: Citizens of the City of Mind
Message-ID: <1991Mar11.070712.4223@cs.ucla.edu>
Date: 11 Mar 91 07:07:12 GMT
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In article <3622.27d4c133@iccgcc.decnet.ab.com> herrickd@iccgcc.decnet.ab.com (daniel lance herrick) writes:
>In article <1204@airs.UUCP>, ian@airs.UUCP (Ian Lance Taylor) writes:

>> One obvious concern with Equifax is that they can distribute personal
>> information without the individual's knowledge.  [Comments about usenet
   deleted].

>This contains an assertion [which] I think both [is] naive.

>When one of the purveyors of mailing lists distributes personal 
>information, the information they distribute is a mailing address,
>the person buying it paid ten cents or a dollar for the information.
>The reason they spent the money was so they could make a targeted
>sales pitch.  The pitch arrives soon, and the individual knows
>his mailing address has been distributed.

The individual gets mail, but s/he does not necessarily know what
information about him/her was sold or who sold it.  The individual
may know his/her mailing address has been distributed, but s/he does
not know what else was.  Consider the case of the ``preapproved credit
cards''; surely more information has been obtained than just the address.

Anyway, when did I ever make Equifax my agent and ask them to sell info
about me?

David