-Caveat Lector-
See and Be Seen
Does your TV spy on you?
by Brendan I. Koerner
July/August 2001
Media executives and TV addicts alike have been celebrating the advent of
interactive television, like TiVo and Microsoft's UltimateTV. But the technology has
the potential of turning into a public-relations nightmare. In March, the
Denver-based Privacy Foundation reported that TiVo, a popular set-top box that can
digitally record up to 30 hours of programming, sends nightly activity reports back to
corporate headquarters. Using a built-in modem, TiVo transmits reams of information on
everything from the console's internal temperature to users' viewing records. Do you
have a weakness for "Judge Judy" that you'd prefer to keep secret? The folks at TiVo
can find out.
The company insists that it removes the data's personal markers and keeps only
"anonymous viewing information." But Richard M. Smith, the Privacy Foundation's chief
technology officer, says the practice conflicts with TiVo's written promise to its
customers that "all of your personal viewing information remains on your receiver in
your home."
Any of TiVo's 150,000-some users can opt out of the data collection, but few
have done so—perhaps because the opt-out instructions are buried deep within the
Byzantine literature that accompanies the device. And while the company's privacy
policy forbids the peddling of customer information to advertisers, the manual takes
care to note that rules "may change over time."
The Privacy Foundation report, and testimony from Smith at a House Energy and
Commerce Committee hearing in April, spurred the Federal Trade Commission to launch an
inquiry into whether TiVo violates its own data-collection guidelines. But technology
companies are well prepared to counter such government intervention. The industry has
organized to oppose legislation that would ban any data harvesting not explicitly
authorized by the customer. Groups like the innocuous-sounding Online Privacy Alliance
(OPA)—whose members include Microsoft, AOL, and Yahoo—advocate letting the industry
regulate itself.
Among the lobby's primary targets have been state lawmakers, particularly in
California. Last year, high-tech clout helped defeat a bill in the California
legislature that would have prohibited interactive TV providers from disclosing
customers' viewing habits. aol circulated a letter to legislators claiming the law
"would harm the development of the Internet and e-commerce," and the American
Electronics Association (another OPA member) spent more than $140,000 on lobbying in
the three months during which the bill was debated.
The California measure was killed in committee, but the industry has had little
time to celebrate. Over the first four months of this year, 465 privacy-related laws
were introduced in state legislatures around the nation. If corporate data collection
becomes an "opt-in" practice, as many of those bills propose, interactive TV will end
up being far less interactive than its creators had hoped.
Read the article online:
http://www.motherjones.com/magazine/JA01/tivo.html
Check out the latest from Mother Jones at:
http://motherjones.com
<A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/";>www.ctrl.org</A>
DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER
==========
CTRL is a discussion & informational exchange list. Proselytizing propagandic
screeds are unwelcomed. Substance—not soap-boxing—please! These are
sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory'—with its many half-truths, mis-
directions and outright frauds—is used politically by different groups with
major and minor effects spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought.
That being said, CTRLgives no endorsement to the validity of posts, and
always suggests to readers; be wary of what you read. CTRL gives no
credence to Holocaust denial and nazi's need not apply.
Let us please be civil and as always, Caveat Lector.
========================================================================
Archives Available at:
http://peach.ease.lsoft.com/archives/ctrl.html
<A HREF="http://peach.ease.lsoft.com/archives/ctrl.html";>Archives of
[EMAIL PROTECTED]</A>
http:[EMAIL PROTECTED]/
<A HREF="http:[EMAIL PROTECTED]/";>ctrl</A>
========================================================================
To subscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email:
SUBSCRIBE CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED]
To UNsubscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email:
SIGNOFF CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Om
