Windows 10 unified store starts to appear for Insiders

[Saracen]

There's a thin fine line between paranoia and taking measures for your own security, careful which way you drift.

Perhaps, but it depends how highly you value your privacy, and your right not to be data-profiled by companies you don't want building data on you.

The tendencies of companies to build as extensive a data profile as they can, on EVERYONE they can, is extremely widespread. It is not paranoia to think many, most and likely all large companies do this, when many of them have been caught doing it. And given that many do it, it's hardly paranoid to assume it's likely the others are too.

And for a very simple reason. That data is very valuable to their marketing effort. I fully undersrand why they do it. If they only did it to people that consented, I'd have no problem. Trouble is, I do not and NEVER will consent, and there is no inducement in the realms of reality they can offer that will change that.

So we have a situation where we KNOW many companies profile us, with or without consent, with or without even informing us. We KNOW that once such data is out there, and that your chances of ever getting it deleted are absolutely minimal at best.

So IF you or I care, and I do, you are pretty much compelled to go to extremes to ensure your data doesn't get out there in the first place, because once it has, it's too late. It then comes down to how far you go to prevent it.

I admit I'm somewhat cynical, and tend to adopt the attitude that if it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, has webbed feet, is covered in feathers and quacks, there's a pretty decent chance it's a duck, not a rhinoceros. When large companies repeatedly take steps entirely consistent with data acquisition and warehousing, I'm going to assume there's at least a decent chance they're going to be data mining.

But I value a quiet home life. I don't EVER want unsolicted junk mail, unsolicited marketing emails and have a £100 call blocker on my phone line to ensure I NEVER get junk phone calls. Or rather, at worst, I get my blocker informing me someone's ringing, but NOBODY gets through unless they're either on my whitelist, or I accept the message from the blocker and accept the call. From marketing companies, I never would and I think that when they hit that call blocker, they give up, because I've gone from several calls a day to none in months.

None of this is paranoia. It's that I value peace and quiet, and privacy, VERY highly, and take the steps that that demands these days.

[shaithis]

As for NSA/GCHQ, I regard that as a serious but rather different issue. As long as appropriate safeguards and oversight is in place, I see a marked difference between intelligence services snooping for national security or crime prevention reasons, and corporates doing it so they can sell me stuff.

I don't have a particular probiem with GCHQ, for instance. Anything they find in my emails, phone conversations etc is going to bore them rigid. Corporates have NO valid justification for snooping on me that I find acceptable.

I would much prefer to protect my content, rather than my trends. How much privacy or intrusions can be caused by people knowing when you did something or what demo-graph you sit in....as opposed to knowing the contents of your emails/texts/phonecalls?

And that's before we talk about how bad the government have been with security. All that data filed away nicely for all those nefarious hackers to dip into.

[Corky34]

There's a thin fine line between paranoia and taking measures for your own security, careful which way you drift.

It's only paranoia if your thoughts or beliefs are not based on facts, irrational and/or delusional.
Based on what we know i would say it's perfectly rational to be concerned.

I would much prefer to protect my content, rather than my trends. How much privacy or intrusions can be caused by people knowing when you did something or what demo-graph you sit in....as opposed to knowing the contents of your emails/texts/phonecalls?

I would say the context (who we speak too, how often, how long, etc, etc) is far more important than the content, with the context you get insights into who we are and the relationships between us, of our importance to each other, our interests, values, and the various roles we play.

You don't want to listen to every conversation as that takes a lot of time and is difficult to automate, using just the context (metadata) you can create a system that automatically links everything together, a relationship database.

[Saracen]

I would much prefer to protect my content, rather than my trends. How much privacy or intrusions can be caused by people knowing when you did something or what demo-graph you sit in....as opposed to knowing the contents of your emails/texts/phonecalls?

And that's before we talk about how bad the government have been with security. All that data filed away nicely for all those nefarious hackers to dip into.

In the absence of valid, genuine reasons for government snooping, I agree. But there is a genuine case for intelligence services snooping. The questions, IMHO, centre around how, to what extent, on whom and why, and with what degree of independent oversight.

And that's a perfectly valid debate as to what you, or I, or others do and don't find acceptable or justified. I'm certainly happy to debate that, too, but I feel it's an entirely different issue from companies tracking everything they can about us all, so they can sell us ..... stuff.

I don't conflate the two issues.

The intrusion, however, from companies knowing is two-fold. First, what I had for breakfast, where I like to go on holiday, what books or magazines I read, what cereal I eat, how many kids (if any) I have is none of their bleeping business. Second, they use it to target me with attempts to sell me stuff, be it letters, emails or worst of all (until I put that call blocker in) phone calls.

If I had my way, NO company, absolutely NONE, would EVER seek to initiate sales contact via any direct method whatever. Passive marketing via TV ads is irrirating enough, but I deal with that by recording the TV I want to watch and skipping or editing out the ads. I don't want junkmail, spam email, knocks at the door or phone calls trying to sell me stuff, about anything, from anyone, under any circumstances.

And the harm is that first, I deeply resent being spyed on for THEIR benefit, not mine (unlike government bodies trying to catch criminals, terrorists, etc), and commercial junk is their benefit, not mine. And second, that I have to waste my time separating junk mail and email from genuine stuff, answering phone calls, and the door, etc.

Whether the alleged extent of government snooping is justified or not, there is at least SOME of it that's in the public interest. NONE of this commercial snooping, on me, is in any way in my interest.

[shaithis]

www.mpsonline.org.uk
www.tpsonline.org.uk

Apart from the odd scam being run from India, these stop them spamming you. No need to remove your online presence or obfuscate your digital footprint.

[Saracen]

www.mpsonline.org.uk
www.tpsonline.org.uk

Apart from the odd scam being run from India, these stop them spamming you. No need to remove your online presence or obfuscate your digital footprint.

Oh, I had a good laugh at that.

Do they hell stop it. In theory, yeah. In practice, no. I've been registered with both for years, and while they might have stopped some companies, others ignore the hell out of them.

I'll say it again - the ONLY way to be sure your data isn't used and/or abused is to not let it get out in the wild in the first place. Once it has, it's too late.

Perhaps you don't care? Fair enough, valid viewpoint. But I do care.

Perhaps you regard it as an acceptable trade-off for convenience. Again, valid viewpoint, but I don't regard it as acceptable.

Clearly, it's not possible to prevent any data getting out. But I do prevent anything I can getting out. For instance, my bank don't have my phone number. They aren't happy about it, and keep asking for it, but they're not going to get it. Why? Because despite repeatedly being told NOT to pester me with telesales calls, they repeatedly did. Would I be interested in this investment, or that type of account? No, I bleeping wouldn't be. So, I changed number and refuse to give them the new one. But they "need it", they say. When queried if they can't operate the account without it, it turns out they can, when told they aren't getting it and if that's unacceptable, close the account. It seems it's "mandatory" except if they have to close the account, when it magically isn't mandatory any more.

The same has happened with several online companies. It's "required" to place an order, unless the alternative is to cancel the order, when it suddenly isn't mandatory .... though to be fair, a couple have opted to cancel the order. At which point, I say "okay, cancel it, I'll order elsewhere", and hang up.

I've said before that I'm VERY careful who gets my phone number. I meant it. HMRC wanted it too, but I told them "no". For a start, I don't want telephone conversations with HMRC. I want those conversations on the record.

Once data is out there, despite what SOME companies promise, they DO pass it on. For instance, ever tried giving exactly ONE company a unique form of address, and specifying no marketing usage? This might be, for instance, incorrect initials, or a non-existant house name in the address. Then, wait and see if, and from who, mail starts arriving addressed in that way? I have. For 30+ years.

The ONLY way to be sure any data about you isn't used and abused is to prevent it, as far as you can, getting out in the first place. If you care. Nothing else, short of that, can be certain to work. Nothing at all.

[crossy]

www.mpsonline.org.uk
www.tpsonline.org.uk

Apart from the odd scam being run from India, these stop them spamming you. No need to remove your online presence or obfuscate your digital footprint.

Sorry, I'm going to agree with Saracen on that. MPS and TPS are actually very worthwhile, but they're only covering UK companies that volunteer to abide by the rules. Unfortunately it does zero against the non-UK companies (as you rightly say) or UK-cowboys, like the ones that use these automated systems that provide no option to opt out, (and withhold/fake their incoming number so you can't report them to OfCom).

I've stopped giving my landline to friends/family, preferring to use mobile instead.

[Saracen]

Sorry, I'm going to agree with Saracen on that. MPS and TPS are actually very worthwhile, but they're only covering UK companies that volunteer to abide by the rules. Unfortunately it does zero against the non-UK companies (as you rightly say) or UK-cowboys, like the ones that use these automated systems that provide no option to opt out, (and withhold/fake their incoming number so you can't report them to OfCom).

I've stopped giving my landline to friends/family, preferring to use mobile instead.

Absolutely agree on TPS and MPS - worthwhile, but incomplete. Not ineffective, but certainly not wholly effective.

A large part of my gripe is with those automated hunt-group type silent calls. Which is why I installed the call blocker I mentioned (or might have been in a different thread). Essentially, it picks up caller ID, and

- if it matches a whitelist entry, puts it through without further action, or
- if it matches a blacklist entry, plays a blacklist message to to caller and disconnects. House phone has NOT wrung. Or
- if callerid not matched, or not available, one of several things happens, depending on user config.

For instance, no callerid received, or it is but isn't known, and the unit plays a message to the caller saying "record a message saying who you are". If no audio is detected, it plays a second and final message asking again. If still no audio is detected, it says "unidentified callers are not accepted" and disconnects the line. Up to that point, the house phone hasn't rung. My phone ONLY rings if the caller says something, at which point the blocker rings my phone and plays the message. ONLY IF I accept the call does the unit put the caller through. From the caller's perspective, they have no way to tell if I rejected the call, or I simply wasn't in to accept.

Silent calls are a thing of the past. They cannot get through. The blocker deals with them, and I don't get pestered. If a cold-caller leaves a message, I do get a phone ringing, but it's the blocker leaving a message, not the caller, who ONLY gats through to me if I accept the call.

Since the blocker went in, NO cold callers have left a mesage, so my phone hasn't rung. Maybe none have called, but suddenly stopping exactly when I put the blocker in seems unlikely. So I assume those that have tried, when confonted with the blocker realise WHY it's there, know carrying on is a waste of time, so don't bother.

Since the blocker went in, zero silent calls and zero cold calls.

But it cost me £100 to put in a blocker to prevent calls, INCLUDING from UK-based companies that if they complied with TPS wouldn't be calling in the first place, BECAUSE my personal data has ended up on marketing databases including, it seems, my phone number.

Which, of course, is my point. That ONE piece of personal data, if it gets given to ONE wrong contact and ends up on a database, can (and did) result in a deluge of pestering calls. So, without the blocker, either I get pestered by marketing or silent calls, including waking me up after working all night, or I have to turn phone ringers off and then even family can't get me in an emergency.

I don't pay for a phone line so telemarketers can pester me trying to sell me stuff. I don't EVER want such calls ( or mail, email, knocks on the door, etc) from ANY company, bar none, and I've done everything I can to opt out. Yet, these .... and I'm having great trouble not breaking forum swearing words here, so substitute your own severe expletive .... 'people' continue to pester me.

I was asked earlier about 'harm'. How about this. It is commonplace these days for potential employers to 'vet' candidates via social media. Does anyone here think it implausible that that will be, or already has been extended to 'databases' that offer profile information, on candidates. If you, reader, think that never happens, I can tell you you are wrong.

So .... you will never know if something in that data profile eliminates you. It could be an unhealtny diet, it could be risky hobbies, it coukd be socially dubious but private activities. It could be as simple as them wanting people without young kids. There are countless possibilities, and the rejected candidate will never know it was something in their 'profile' that got them rejected. Right now, as far as I know, this level of check isn't done on 'ordinary' people, but IT IS on some people. It'll only get more commonplace, as databases expand, and access costs drop. What we have right now is, IMHO, the thin end of the wedge. But the wedge exists.

I'm probably very fortunate compared to most people. I don't have to worry about employers, since I work for myself and am effectively semi-retired anyway. I don't owe anyone money, don't and as far as I can tell, never will want loans or credit. I can get away with keeping a very low data profile. Not off-grid, but close to it. I can also conceive of going further off-grid, including possibly entirely offline, internet-free. I never use store cards, reward cards etc, and pay cash in supermarkets, because there's no way I'm 'selling' my shopping data to a supermarket for a bit of discount. I rarely use credit or debit cards, and sent back a contactless one I was sent recently. I'm NOT using contactless cards for small payments. Cash works just fine for me, not least because it's one more bit of profile data I'm not giving out. I gave up my contract mobile phone 15 or 20 years ago, and use a PAYG dumbphone. Well, two actually. One for family and friends tgat's really emergency only, and effectively a 'burner' for everything else, and the SIM and number, and phone, changes periodically.

Oh, and very little mail-order buying, don't use ebay or Paypal (or haven't for many years), and don't use, or need, online banking. In fact, online banking us disabled on my accounts and can only be reactivated by me, in person, in a specified bank branch. It can't be done online, by letter or by phone.

I do, therefore, keep a pretty low profile. And I prefer it that way.