If you’re a customer of Verizon Wireless, you might not be happy to learn that the company will begin collecting personal data and sharing it with “affiliates, agents and parent companies.” This means that unless customers act, their information will spread, possibly landing them on a number of unwanted lists. The data they’re looking to hand over: “services purchased (including specific calls you make and receive), billing info, technical info and location info.” Billing info, of course, includes your address and phone number, and possibly your Social Security Number.
The only thing a customer can do to avoid this situation is to opt out. That’s right: Verizon is putting everyone in the pool and giving them 45 days to say no. Unfortunately, many will completely miss the issue since not everyone fully reads their phone bills. Plus, there’s the issue of those who don’t receive paper bills. The above-linked account from ReadWriteWeb notes that the author did not see any notification in the online account. Even worse, the link which supposedly will allow you to opt out was not available.
Verizon acts like this is a benign measure, but it very well might not be. While they will only share information with “affiliates, agents and parent companies,” the first term in that list, affiliates, is a bit suspect. How does one become an affiliate? For all we know any third party could pay for the right to be an affiliate, which would give Verizon the right to sell them your data. Not cool.
Make sure you follow the instructions to opt out. It’s bad enough that there are rogue companies which circumvent telemarketing laws. Now it looks like Verizon is trying to slip by in a legal manner. Unfortunately, this will not reach everyone, and a large number of unsuspecting customers will have their personal data sold to third parties. Again, that’s not at all cool.
Share this Post
Subscribe and Follow
Subscribe to the Going Cellular feed via RSS and follow Going Cellular on Twitter!
{ 0 comments… add one now }