Inherent Wealth in Individual Privacy

There is inherent value in each individual, and in actuality each individual has inherent wealth in the very fabric of their lives. Companies know that you have inherent wealth, and many companies out there are looking to exploit your inherent wealth today. Companies know that we do not only go around each day to purchasing products and services with our money, but they want to mine information about our actual purchases and other habits; it is undoubtedly a profitable resource, sometimes more than charging for the products and services themselves. These companies are actively exploiting your privacy on a regular basis. Your cell phone carrier, the cable company, your health insurance company, the grocery store card you use, your credit card, your social networking accounts, your free email accounts, along with some free applications on your computer and maybe some malicious applications that are data mining on your computer - like Google Desktop (GOOG $567.85/share - Nov 12 4:00pm ET), and other services you may use as well. You think these companies have your best interests at heart? Your grocery store gives you coupons and rewards because they sell your data and spending habits to other companies, they also track this data and know customer spending trends and know when and how to drive their sales. Your credit card or bank doesn't give you cash back, rewards, or frequent flyer miles for nothing. You're not only paying for interest but they're collecting your data and are using it - to make money. Your cell phone carrier not only pays only a small percentage for the phone you bought from them and the service they're offering you - but they also sell your data to other companies. Cable companies often do the same thing. Try searching for health insurance on Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Sheild, when you enter your data about 5 minutes later you'll get calls from 2 or 3 different competing health insurance companies. Once these companies get enough data they sell it, and sometimes they make it non-personally identifiable before offing it for cash to other companies. They sell your data to marketing researchers that employ some basic data mining techniques. Marketing researchers use this data along with other data from other companies they've purchased data from, with the phone book, your town hall records, newspapers, blogs, social networking sites, etc. and reconstruct data that is personally identifiable. At this point the data increases in value significantly as they've got the tools to paint a very a complete picture of your life and your habits. Once they have reached their goal of creating their database filled with a vast store of data about peoples lives they may sell that data to marketing companies, other researchers, or even government agencies. Voila, now all these marketing companies that have bought your data, maybe hundreds or more, have some data about you and some maybe have things you may not want them to know about you. You may apply for a job one day at these companies and be denied because they don't like your product purchases as the local grocery store. Perhaps, there's something else in your data that they don't like... on top of that these are the same companies that are going to target you with advertisements specifically designed for you - through the internet, the mail, the telephone, and even on TV. These are not particularly new trends, but never before have market research companies been able to process and mine so much data so quickly, nevermind make such a large profit by selling it to so many other companies. If you read the companies privacy policies your dealing with then you'll see that nothing is really free and that by taking advantage of these FREE and other special offers which may seem convenient, or even fun - you're actually alowing these companies to exploit some of your inherent wealth - your privacy. Not only do these companies make money off of exploiting your privacy, they also pass the costs on to you. Yes, these companies have some expenditures in the process of exploiting your life, and these expenditures are passed onto you directly or indirectly. In the case that you're paying for your product or service, the cost of running these services, creating these products, data mining/market research, and advertising are all passed directly over to you on your bill. In the case that your service is free then you will undoubtedly not only have your privacy exploited, but you be targeted with ads directly through the company offering the free service itself. You may not fully understand this process, but over the last 10 years we've seen the some of the greatest increases in technology coupled with more privacy exploitation than ever, and possibly the greatest transfer of wealth in the history of the western world. As we continue to approach what appears to be a great financial meltdown, it's time for people to reconsider their understanding and definition of wealth, economy, and what expectations they have for companies they're willing to work for and do business with in the future. If we allow our privacy to be completely given up or taken from us, we will see our other freedoms erode even further...

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