Current Shareware 1994 January/SHAR194.ISO/articles/cpd322.zip/CPD322.TXT

Text File | 1993-09-05 | 18KB | 376 lines

Computer Privacy Digest Fri, 03 Sep 93              Volume 3 : Issue: 022

Today's Topics:                Moderator: Dennis G. Rears

                           Spousal Signatures
                             Re: Ramblings
                               Ramblings
                    Re:  Caller ID Blocking and 911

   The Computer Privacy Digest is a forum for discussion on the
  effect of technology on privacy.  The digest is moderated and
  gatewayed into the USENET newsgroup comp.society.privacy
  (Moderated).  Submissions should be sent to
  [e-mail] and administrative requests to
  [e-mail].
   Back issues are available via anonymous ftp on ftp.pica.army.mil
  [129.139.160.133].
----------------------------------------------------------------------

Date: Wed, 1 Sep 1993 13:02:07 -0400 (EDT)
From: Paul Robinson <[e-mail]>
Subject: Spousal Signatures
Organization: Tansin A. Darcos & Company, Silver Spring, MD USA

Cristy <[e-mail]>, writes in Comp Privacy:

> For those that may not understand the privacy implications of such
> a practice, one document gives the mortgage company the right to
> obtain all credit information on me including a credit report, bank
> balances, salary history, etc.  And as discussed above this
> information was obtained *without* my knowledge or signature.

1.  In general, absent contractual or speciai agreements, a husband and
wife are jointly and severally bound by agreements related to their
marriage.  This comes from the old Biblical proscription that when two
people were married they were "of one flesh."  This means that if the
husband contracts to buy a house, the wife is stuck with the decision
too.  In fact, it's not as strong as it was many years ago, when a married
woman could not even be considered to do anything individually unless
her husband consented to it, but the opposite was not true.

In fact, a husband and wife team used the law as it stood back in the
1800s to argue they were not guilty of conspiracy to commit murder.  The
law (then) defines a husband and wife as essentially one person, and one
person CANNOT commit a conspiracy.  They won, too.

2.  Any company may obtain a credit report on anyone, with or without
their consent, as long as there is a legitimate business reason to do
so.  This was one of the things that was questioned about the alleged
incidents in the Perot campaign, where it was alleged that some people
had credit reports done without their permission.  Well, if someone
has a legitimate business reason, they can apply for a credit report
on someone, even without the person's consent.  It could be said that
people who volunteered for the campaign might be handling property of
the campaign or checks or money; therefore, to make sure that some of
these people do not have records of being habitual thieves or being
severely in debt, there would be a legitimate business reason to check
their credit.  This is stretching a little, but the law has enough holes
in it to allow almost anything, legally.

I might note that chances are, in one of *some* document you have given
to the bank - which might include your application for a checking account
or a savings account - is a blanket permission to obtain a credit rating
on you (which does not have a time limit on it, either.)  Or on the loan
application or someplace on there.  While applying for credit with someone
is a legitimate business reason for them to obtain a report on you, with
or without your permission, most places - to avoid misunderstandings - make
it clear that they will request credit reports.




---
Paul Robinson - [e-mail]



------------------------------

Date: Wed, 1 Sep 1993 13:18:13 -0400 (EDT)
From: "Tansin A. Darcos & Company" <[e-mail]>

Kelly Bert Manning <[e-mail]>, writes in Comp Privacy:

> In a previous article, [e-mail] (Scott Leapman) says:
> >
> >> We have the same system here in the San Francisco Bay area at
> >> most grocery stores.
> >>
> >> I've used it once or twice, but prefer writing a check rather
> >> than using the ATM card.  I just think it makes keeping the
> >> check book balanced a little easier.

He didn't say which netork they were using.  Since that's in California,
the largest regional one is Star System.  The two big international ones
are Plus (owned by Visa) and Cirrus (owned by Master Card).

You will find that if you use a debit ATM card, in addition to having
the money immediately deducted from your account (no float time) they
charge you from 10c to 75c to make the transaction.  If your bank, S&L
or Credit union doesn't charge you for each check you write, then writing a
check gives you a day or two of float, and the store doesn't charge you to
pay them by check.

> Why other people can't use cash has always puzzled me.

1.  Charging by credit card means the credit card company lets you use
    your money for 30 days interest free (if you have the strength to
    pay off the bill in full when it comes, or you use an American
    Express Card which requires full payment).

2.  If the merchant sells you something that breaks down and you can't
    get them to settile, you can get the credit card company to
    pass the charge back to the merchant.

3.  Many credit card companies are offering additional warranty
    protection above and beyond the protection granted by the
    manufacturer, when purchased with their plastic.  At least one
    bank in Arizona did offer this when you used a check from it,
    but I don't know if they do now.

4.  If the merchant loses your transaction, you get the merchandice free!
    It happened a lot more when the merchants used only tissue slips.

5.  A transaction can sometimes be delayed for 60 days or longer.  You
    don't pay for something until you get the bill for it.

6.  Here in the Washington Suburbs, the MOST automated teller network
    has 100% penetration with every singly bank, credit union and S&L
    being a member of it.  The state of Maryland now does all food
    stamp transactions by debit card using the MOST network.  This means
    that every grocery store in the Washington Area that wants to
    accept food stamps (and every grocery in Maryland) has a swipe
    reader.  That means all of them take ATM cards, as well as
    credit cards.  Paying for groceries by credit card means that you
    also don't have to carry cash for that either.

7.  There is a credit card tied to the Quicken program, that for an
    extra fee of about $3 a month, will allow you to automatically
    download your credit card statement into Quicken, or the bank
    will mail you a disk.  If you do manage your money responsibly,
    that's another advantage.

8.  Purchases by ATM often have a transaction charge from 10c to
    $1.50.  Purchases by credit card have no transaction fee in
    almost every case.  (Cash advances are a different story.)

The disadvantage to using plastic is that it doesn't "hurt" the way
spending "real" money does.  I purchased a $325 Seagate SCSI hard drive
using my credit card 4 years ago (today that 84 meg drive would have cost
much less and $325 would buy me over 300 meg.) Yet this was less "painful"
than when I spent $200 to purchase a 14,400 baud modem which I paid for
with $200 in cash and the rest on my plastic. Even though I make more now
than I did when I bought the hard drive (which I am still using 4 years
later).   Also, people tend to spend more on plastic than they do
on cash.

> I've never even applied for a credit card despite getting repeated
> solicitations over the decades.

Lucky you, I guess.  It means you don't have the bills that go with it.
It also means that you have exactly ZERO chance of being able to rent
a car if you ever need to do so.  Also, you will find that some video
stores will frown on renting tapes to you.  If neither of these
activities is of any interest to you, then I guess it's not a problem.
Some people who want to take long trips, if the car that they own is
not really comfortable, will rent a nice car like a convertable or a
town car, for not a lot of money.  Some people, like me, do not own
an automobile, and either use public transit or cabs to get around.
Parking alone is more than I spend on bus fare each day.  Insurance,
taxes, tags and payments can be $500 a month or more.  If you can
commute to work, renting cars when you need them can be much less
expensive.  And not having a credit card makes it difficult.

Two men can walk into a car rental agency.  One is a deadbeat who has no
assets except a secured VISA card with $400 available credit.  The other
has $5,000 in cash. The deadbeat with the secured VISA will drive out with
a rental car. The guy with $5,000 will be turned away if they don't call
the DEA first for the reward for turning in people with large amounts of
money.

I note that you said you do not have a CREDIT card.  That could mean
that you have a Travel and Entertainment card, such as a gasoline
card or an American Express Card; these do not allow financing and require
full payment at the end of the month.

> ATMs can now be used to pay most utility bills, and
> mortgages and other payments can be pre-authorized, so my wife and
> I rarely write more than 1 or 2 checks a month, sometimes none!

Well, since you can do that there, more power to you.  But are they
charging you extra to pay by ATM vs. paying by check.  If ATM
charges are 30c per transaction and checks are 25c each (plus the 30c to
mail them), then ATM use is cheaper.  Of course, the answer is to find a
bank that doesn't charge for each check written and figure costs.

I don't know.  For some people, not having a credit card keeps them from
spending money they shouldn't have.  But that means there are some
transactions that they cannot perform because places won't deal with
them without one.

---
Paul Robinson - [e-mail]




------------------------------

Date: Wed, 1 Sep 93 14:15:26 -0700
From: [e-mail] (David Gast)
Subject: Re: Ramblings

Our Moderator wrote and before that I wrote:

>> "Further, I do not buy the argument that just because someone
>> pays for an 800 call, they deserve to be able to invade my
>> privacy."

>   How does somebody that you called on their nickel having your phone
> number "invade your privacy"?  Anonymity, maybe?  What exactly is
> privacy, anonymity?  Let's See.......  [definitions deleted to save
space.]

I won't get into a long discussion of privacy versus anonomity, as I feel
they overlap to some extent, particularly compare "Secrecy, concealment"
with "being unknown or obscure,"  and the moderator's own comment that the
"use of it [violates] your privacy."  It is this use of it that I am
concerned with.  The issue is what does the recipient of an 800-number call
does with the number.  I really doubt that many recipients just look at the
number and throw it away.  They use it as an index into one or more
databases also using phone number as index.  They can selll the information
to others for use in creating or updating other databases.

One big problem is that phone numbers are not in a one-to-one correspondence
with people.  A person can have more than one phone number.  Similarily,
more than one person frequently shares a billing number, that is, the
number reported by ANI.  It could be a simple case like roommates sharing
a phone.  It could be that you call from work, and thousands of people
all have the same ANI.

> If somebody calls you they have interrupted your activities.  If you
> don't like it you can screen calls.  The sheer fact that you have a
> telephone that can receive calls means that you have allowed anyone who
> dials that number to interrupt you.

Having them call back is the least of my worries.  (And as anyone who has
called recently can tell you, I either screen my calls or answer with the
name of the person calling.  If I am not 99% sure, I let the answering
machine pick up on the first ring.  Incidentally, it really freaks people
out to have me say their name when they call.  They want to know how I
invaded their privacy!)

>  If it wasn't for the SSN we have a another key (birthdate & address).
> The discussion should be about the use of the data base and who has access
> not if they have the right to ask it.

I agree in part.  I am concerned about the use of phone number, not the
mere fact it exists.  Given current law, which places few restrictions on
what private entities can do with personally identifiable information,
the issue becomes do they have the right to collect it because once they
have collected it, they can do with it what they want.  There are a few
exceptions, but not many.

>   I seen discussions if merchants have the right for driver license
> numbers, social security numbers, or phone numbers.  They don't.  If
> however you want want to cash that check they do.  They want it to
> protect themselves if the check bounces not to get a database on you.
> Radio Shack just wants to send you a catalog.  If you don't want it throw
> it out.

I would not provide my driver's license or SSN to any merchant.  If they
do not like it, then I will take my business elsewhere.  And I have walked
out of stores when they wanted to see identification for a credit card
purchase.  (I usually pay cash, but sometimes I use a credit card, which
incidentally I did not give my SSN in order to get.)

I think you are being naive, however, if you think they want the information
solely to protect themselves.  As Mr. Alvin Toffler has written in Power
Shift when you go to the store, you pay twice.  Once for the item you purchase
and once for the information they collect about you.  Information is power,
and power is money.  That database helps them get more money from consumers
like me.  Check out the trade rags for Supermarkets and you will find many
articles on these databases.  The information is so valuable that
supermarkets and other stores can now dictate to the manufactures what their
packaging, etc, will be like.  In the old days, the manufacturers did what
they wanted and told the stores to stock it.

And BTW even the unwanted catalog desroys trees and creates additional
garbage, not to mention the toxics produced as a by-product of the
manufacturing and printing process.

David


------------------------------

From: Duncan Frissell <[e-mail]>
Subject: Ramblings
Date: 2 Sep 1993 14:12:00 -0400
Organization: PANIX Public Access Internet and Unix, NYC

D >If you use credit cards they can determine your purchases.  If you use
D >atm cards they can determine where you've been.  If you use celluear
D >phones they can track your movements.

Corection, they may be able to determine all these things about you if you
can be linked to these accounts you are using.  With care, you can obtain
ATM and secured credit/debit cards in names other than your own.  This is
particularly so if you are dealing with overseas financial institutions.
Even domestically, you can use accounts like this in the names of others
though it is a little harder.

A database is only as good as its common field(s).

D >However, privacy/anonymity is getting harder to safeguard.  Let's start
D >discussing ways to use existing technologies to our benefit.

Sounds good.  I must say, however, that I find it simpler to safeguard my
privacy these days than I think that I would have been able to in a small
town or village in the past when everyone knew everything about everyone
else for their entire lives.

Duncan Frissell


"Privacy is a type of information that has its polarity reversed; I
imagine it as anti-information.  In a world where everything is connected
to everything -- where connection and information and knowledge are dirt
cheap -- then disconnection and anti-information and no-knowledge become
expensive."  -- Kevin Kelly

But not too expensive if you work with the pros.  Frissell & Associates,
custom crafted legal regimes since 1969.



--- WinQwk 2.0b#0


------------------------------

Date: Thu, 2 Sep 1993 10:51:23 -0400 (EDT)
From: "Tansin A. Darcos & Company" <[e-mail]>
Subject: Re:  Caller ID Blocking and 911

Monty Solomon <roscom![e-mail]>, writes:

> The following is an excerpt from the "Caller ID And Blocking Fact
> Sheet" I received from New England Telephone.
>
> How Does Line Blocking Work With Emergency Calls?
>         If you have Line Blocking and an emergency service provider
>         has Caller ID, the provider will NOT receive your number
>         UNLESS you unblock your number by pressing *67 (dial 1167
>         on a rotary/pulse phone) before you call '911' or other
>         seven digit emergency numbers.

I *hope* this is a misprint.  Last I heard, 911 *isn't supposed to be
affected* by the setting of Caller ID.  They are supposed to
unconditionally receive the caller's phone number and address in order
that they can make a quick response to you in an emergency.

---
Paul Robinson - [e-mail]




------------------------------


End of Computer Privacy Digest V3 #022
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