- KROGER WANTS YOUR FINGERPRINT!
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- Attention Texans! You are once again being targeted
for a "test" to see how far you will tolerate supermarket privacy-invasion.
Kroger, the nation's largest grocery chain, is using stores in Bryan/College
Station, Texas to test its new "SecureTouch-n-Pay" fingerprint
reader system which "enables customers to shop without needing to
carry a purse, wallet or checkbook by incorporating biometric identity
verification and electronic financial transaction processing at the POS
[Point of Sale]." Those insane enough to participate must sign up
by providing a fingerprint, along with personal and financial data, ID
information, "loyalty" program information, and electronic payment
options.
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- If this program is not stopped cold, someday all shoppers
may be required to provide a fingerprint or DNA sample to simply walk
through the door of a grocery store. The days of shopping at the supermarket
using a fake or traded card are numbered. Pass this information on, and
let Kroger know you don't want this coming to your town. If you are interested
in participating in a protest of this technology, please let us know on
CASPIAN's feedback page at http://www.nocards.org/feedback/index.shtml
.
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- Source: "Biometric Access Corporation's SecureTouch-n-Pay
Brings Enhanced Transaction Processing to Kroger Stores." Biometric
Access Corporation Press Release, April 11, 2002. http://biz.yahoo.com/bw/020411/110184_1.html
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- PLANS TO BUILD ID-TRACKING INTO ALL CONSUMER GOODS
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- The Auto-ID Center at MIT is studying ways of imbedding
computer RFID chips into just about everything, including egg cartons,
eyeglasses, books, toys, trucks, and money. Smaller than a grain of sand,
the tiny chips send out an identifying signal designed to be picked up
and read by devices in the environment. Reader devices can be installed
in doorways, shelves, refrigerators, medicine cabinets, airports, and more.
Just a few big-name sponsors of the new technology include Wal-Mart, Target,
the Food Marketing Institute, Gillette, Procter & Gamble, Coca-Cola,
UPS, the Postal Service, and the Department of Defense. Stay tuned for
a detailed email on this subject to follow shortly.
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- Source: "Things come alive." USA Today, April
11, 2002. http://www.usatoday.com/life/cyber/tech/2002/04/12/tinyband.htm
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- SUPERMARKET MERGERS AND ACQUISITIONS UP IN 2001
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- In a year where merger and acquisition activity decreased
across the food sector, the notable exception was supermarkets. In 2001,
27 supermarket chains changed hands, contrasted with 24 chains in 2000.
The supermarket industry is becoming so consolidated that many consumers
no longer have viable alternatives to the privacy-infringing national chains.
Ever wonder why there are so few card-free shopping options in your town?
In the past 9 years, 252 supermarket chains (representing thousands
of individual stores) have been swallowed up by the big guys.
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- Source: "Mergers And Acquisition Activity Drops
To Lowest Level In Eight Years." The Food Institute Press Release,
April 17, 2002. http://biz.yahoo.com/bw/020417/172085_1.html
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- For annual data see: http://www.foodinstitute.com/mergerchart.htm
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- JUNK MAIL DATABASES TO ALERT FEDS TO "SUSPICIOUS
BEHAVIOR"?
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- For several years, CASPIAN has been warning that massive
amounts of privately collected retail data could fall into the hands of
the government and be used against citizens. Here's proof that at least
one former U.S. government official is thinking along those lines, too:
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- "Bill Clinton has been outlining how technology
can play a key role in defeating the new brand of terrorism. The former
US president said that information management systems similar to those
used by the big mass mailing companies could provide an early warning about
suspicious behaviour. 'More than 95% of the people that are in the United
States at any given time are in the computers of companies that mail junk
mail and you can look for patterns there,' he told BBC World's ClickOnline."
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- Source: "Clinton backs tech war on terror."
BBC News, April 8, 2002. http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_1912000/1912895.
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- RETAIL CUSTOMER FILES SOUGHT TO AID IN PROFILING
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- ...Federal aviation authorities and two technology companies
called Accenture and HNC Software are planning to test at airports a profiling
system designed to analyze each passenger's living arrangements, travel
and real-estate history, along with a great deal of demographic, financial
and other personal information. Using data-mining and predictive software,
the government then plans to assign each passenger a ''threat index'' based
on his or her resemblance to a terrorist profile. Passengers with high
threat indexes will be flagged as medium or high risks and will be taken
aside for special searches and questioning.
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- Our system ''will check your associates,'' Brett Ogilvie
of Accenture told Business Week. ''It will ask if you have made international
phone calls to Afghanistan, taken flying lessons or purchased 1,000 pounds
of fertilizer.'' The only problem: in order for the system to obtain answers
to those questions, the nation's privacy laws will need to be relaxed.
Federal laws currently restrict the personally identifiable information
that the government can demand from credit-card and phone companies except
as part of a specific investigation.
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- Source: "Silicon Valley's Spy Game." New York
Times Magazine, April 14, 2002. http://www.nytimes.com/2002/04/14/magazine/14TECHNO.
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- CASPIAN JOINS FORCES WITH OTHER PRIVACY ADVOCATES
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- CASPIAN founder Katherine Albrecht attended the first
ever National Conference of Privacy Activists held this past weekend in
Providence, Rhode Island. Sponsored by Privacy Journal and its publisher,
Robert Ellis Smith, the conference brought together more than 60 privacy
experts from 24 states and 4 Canadian provinces to discuss a broad range
of privacy-related issues. Topics covered by attendees including retail
privacy, national ID, protecting medical and financial records, and the
latest invasive technologies. A plan emerged to form a national congress
of privacy advocates to work together on a variety of issues. We'll keep
you posted on developments.
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- Here is a recap of a particularly lively discussion:
"Privacy advocates alarmed by prospect of national ID." Providence
Journal, April 15, 2002. http://www.projo.com/news/content/projo_20020415_id15.5d4c7c1a.
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- CASPIAN'S ANTI-CARD ARGUMENTS FEATURED IN NC NEWSPAPER
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- Food Lion and Winn Dixie's card programs are discussed
in this North Carolina article, which prominently features many of our
anti-card arguments.
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- Source: "Customer loyalty cards: Price vs. privacy."
Fayetteville Observer, April 17, 2002. http://www.fayettevillenc.com/obj_stories/2002/apr/b07cards.shtml
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- FLASHBACK: GET READY FOR THE PRIVACY BACKLASH
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- What's the answer to the erosion of our privacy? A few
good sized protests! Here's an excerpt from an article warning retail executives
that consumers are getting fed up. Let's prove it.
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- Experts say that consumers are the sleeping giant of
the privacy movement. [One privacy advocate] blames the current apathy
on the fact that many advocates have been talking to the wrong audience.
"Privacy advocates have only been speaking to a finite audience within
the technology community and the public policy world," he says. "They
need to rip a page out of other consumer advocacy initiatives like the
environmental movement." You'll know that the privacy message has
struck home with consumers, he says, when we see the kinds of mass demonstrations
that plagued the World Trade Organization gathering in Seattle last year.
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- Source: "Get ready for the privacy backlash."
Darwin Magazine, August, 2001. http://www.darwinmag.com/read/080101/backlash_content.html
(Scroll down to "Agitating for Privacy")
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- CASPIAN - Consumers Against Supermarket Privacy Invasion
and Numbering An information clearinghouse and resource for community and
national action http://www.nocards.org
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