[Tichy]

Am I the only one who finds that a bit silly? Perhaps the next step will be that we won't be allowed to look at other people on the street anymore, because we would gather too much information. What if I want to open a shop and count the pedestrians walking by at a potential location, will police swoop in to throw me in jail?

I wouldn't be surprised if every smartphone with WLAN also "tracks" other people on the street - if it keeps a list of WLANs it recently encountered.

Offering HotSpots would become troublesome, too.

And what about the mobile networks, they already track the location of every one of us? Should only big companies be allowed to collect data?

[DanBC]

> And what about the mobile networks, they already track the location of every one of us?

Those companies are registered with the Data Protection people. They specify what data they are collecting, and why, and they are subject to regulations about what they can do with the data and how long they can keep the data.

> What if I want to open a shop and count the pedestrians walking by at a potential location, will police swoop in to throw me in jail?

You can count people. What you can't do is take an identifying piece of information about that person and store it.

[Tichy]

"Those companies are registered with the Data Protection people."

And it's probably really easy for "the little man" to register with the Data Protection Agency? Or do you need lots of lawyers and lots of money?

[adw]

Every business of any size has to do it. Costs about $100. It's not hard.

[Tichy]

So for 100$ the recycling bins could be back on the street, if they credibly anonymize the data?

[adw]

Well, what they were doing was probably never illegal. That doesn't mean the City of London are obliged to let them do it – they're their bins.

[Tichy]

I thought it was the company responsible for the bins doing it. My bad.

[eterm]

What's the Data Protection Agency?

Data protection is a law, it applies to anyone. There's no such thing as the data protection agency, just the information commissioner.

There's no money and no lawyers fees, do you care to explain yourself?

[moocowduckquack]

Is the Information Commissioners Office, which used to be the Data Protection Registrar, which deals with the Register of Data Controllers. Registration requires a fee which funds the Information Commissioners Office, however this fee is only £35, or £500 if you have a turnover of more than £25 million.

[Tichy]

I was replying to DanBC who mentioned the Data Protection People. I have no idea how this stuff works in Britain.

[7952]

There is a difference between capturing data passively (which this is), and actively trying to extract it. That's the difference between a paparazzi and Google Streetview. Of course the average person has no idea what they are broadcasting.

The reality is that modern gadgets always leek unique data that could be identifiable; and trying to lock down every path is impossible.

Perhaps every app, browser page or network connection should get its own GUID that it always included, un-encrypted in every request by default. Then give users the ability to change it easily on a per app basis. Make laws that require companies to only collect the GUID and no other passively collected information without explicit permission.

[mattmanser]

Your brain can't track millions of people and remember them all forever without breaking a sweat like computers can.

The difference is the scale and the permanence of the data.

And yes, the mobile companies shouldn't be collecting that data even though they are.

When I visit my dominatrix, 15 illicit children or go for my ballet lessons, I want it to stay private from my 3 girlfriends.

There are numerous organisations that could take advantage of that information to blackmail me into doing something I didn't want to, like support pay rises for all the head police officers.

I'm being silly, but what the hell does anyone need this information for, the only possible thing it can be used for is for nefarious purposes. It doesn't really stop crimes, it rarely catches criminals and it doesn't make our lives better. It's expensive, degrading to individual humans to constantly spy on them and is an enabler for horrific crimes against humanity.

Just say no.

[sesqu]

> what the hell does anyone need this information for

Advertising. This isn't the first company to try this, and it sure as hell won't be the last. They want to know where people move, where they look, what stores they visit, and ideally what they googled for last night, and then send targeted ads to smart devices and electronic billboards.