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From: rcd@ico.isc.com (Dick Dunn)
Newsgroups: comp.org.eff.talk,alt.privacy
Subject: Re: Safeway Stores to Accept Charge Cards
Summary: they're already trying to gather personal info here!
Message-ID: <1991Apr6.001044.13134@ico.isc.com>
Date: 6 Apr 91 00:10:44 GMT
References: <13810@asylum.SF.CA.US>
Organization: Interactive Systems Corporation, Boulder, CO
Lines: 28

langz@asylum.SF.CA.US (Lang Zerner) writes:
> According to the San Francisco Chronicle, p. C1, April 4, 1991, the
> national Safeway supermarket chain will soon begin accepting Visa and
> MasterCard for purchases of groceries and other items...
...
> ..."Suzanne McGrath, a supermarket-industry analyst at
> Piper Jaffrey in Portland [Oregon], suggested that banks may be
> subsidizing the cost of the new equipment in order to gain information
> on customer purchases...

Safeway stores here (Boulder, CO) have a critter called a "Preferred
Customer Card".  They use it to gather info about your purchases and
profile you, period.  It's not a future thing, nor a maybe thing.

The idea is that you get one of these cards; you show it every time you
shop (they scan a bar code from it); the items you purchase are recorded
in association with your card ID.  At the end of the month, you get a bunch
of coupons good for discounts or freebies of things you buy regularly.  If
that doesn't make it clear enough that they're gathering profiles on
people, you can read it on the application for the card--there's a state-
ment which says that by applying for the card, you give them permission to
sell the information they gather about you!

I do shop at Safeway.  But I don't have an "Observed Customer Card":-)
And I pay cash.
-- 
Dick Dunn     rcd@ico.isc.com -or- ico!rcd       Boulder, CO   (303)449-2870
   ...Lately it occurs to me what a long, strange trip it's been.