Is Big Brother Watching? Heard of this??

It's true. While I am not a big conspiracy buff at all, I can see some privacy concerns. The idea is to track inventory for manufacturers, distributors & retailers. This is similar to how bar codes and other tracking mechanisms are used today. Apparently, once it is in consumer hands, it is not tracked. However loyalty clubs already track your purchases (e.g. Safeway Card, Albertson's Card) and you are trading privacy for discounts.

Here's an abstract from the New York Times article about it:

Business/Financial Desk | February 25, 2003, Tuesday
TECHNOLOGY; A Radio Chip in Every Consumer Product

By CLAUDIA H. DEUTSCH and BARNABY J. FEDER (NYT) 1668 words
Late Edition - Final , Section C , Page 1 , Column 2
ABSTRACT - Companies as diverse as Gillette, Procter & Gamble, International Paper and Canon USA are teaming up with retailers and customers to apply technology known as radio-frequency identification to tracking products from time they leave assembly line to time they leave store; companies are tagging products with computer chips laden with information about content, origin and destination; are also equipping shelves, doors and walls with sensors that can record that data when products are near; Philips Semiconductor, unit of Royal Philips Electronics, is leading maker of chips; diagram; photo (M) Here's a tip to thieves: If you are bent on stealing packages of Gillette Mach3 razor blades, go someplace other than Tesco's Newmarket Road store in Cambridge, England. There, a ''smart shelf'' continuously queries tiny radio chips embedded in the packages it holds, and senses the silence when one is removed. The system may soon be programmed to alert security when several are taken at once, Greg Sage, a Tesco spokesman, said.

And, yes, Procter & Gamble will notice if a case of Pantene shampoo does not make it to the Wal-mart Supercenter in Broken Arrow, Okla. Its truck is equipped to monitor signals continuously from chips hidden in each case. If any case stops sending its ''Hi, I'm still here'' signal, a monitor in the ''smart truck'' will record exactly when and where.

 

There are some personal products that I don't think anyone would want to know where they are after purchase!

 

Oh,man, it's amazing how urban legends get going.

The article says that Walmart "will quietly begin selling tracking-chipped products to clueless shoppers...but they'd rather you didn't know about it"

What a crock!!

If Walmart didn't want us to know about it, why Walmart announce it in my local paper last week? The RF tags are inventory control tags. Rather than using bar codes, RF tags allow for package counting without having to manually scan each item up close.

Also, newswithviews.com implies that the RF tags are on the product. That's not the case. The RF tags are in the packaging. RF tags are nothing new. Most video & music stores have been using RF tags on their DVD's and CD's for years, because it makes it virtually impossible to leave the store without deactivating the tag at the register (and paying for it) first.

Bottom line: There's no "big brother" RF tag conspiracy. RF tracking of inventory owned by Walmart is not "big brother". Prior to us bying them, they are the property of Walmart, and Walmart has the right to track them in any manner they see fit. If we're going to tell Walmart how to track its property, then who's being big brother, them or us??

 

Well, I got a minor wake-up call a few days ago.
I was changing things around and wishing I had a
telephone jack on the other side of the living
room. Then, I realized I had one that the cable
company had put in for the cable TV. As I
understood it, the cable would not work well
without it, because this was how we would
receive the programming lists and changes.

Well, I wondered if I could also hook our phone
up to it, so I plugged a phone in, heard a dial tone.
then unplugged it to use at a later date. In the
mean time, I got distracted and forgot to plug the
cable TV back into the phone line, finding it still
unplugged a few days later.

Then the questions started. Our television has
been fine: the programming has continued,
there have been no interruptions in service, and
we still receive the lists at 2 a.m. The Internet
service has continued as well. Nothing at all has
changed on my end, so what is the purpose of
the phone line??? Well, the only feasible
answer is that they were receiving something
from us, or they would not have gone to the
trouble and expense of putting in a new phone
line over there.

It is still not plugged in.

 

Abiyah, in layman's terms, the phone jack is a "backup system" that allows the cable box to receive programming in the event the bidirectional data link to the cable box is interrupted (which might happen in, for example, a power loss). There's no way for the cable box to monitor phone conversations or the like, since the boxes aren't designed that way. I'm willing to bet that, within 30 days, you'll probably experience some type of interruption in data, most likely the guide lineup.

If you have an alarm system, it, too, will be hooked up to a phone line. In fact, it will cease to operate in the event of an emergency without that hookup.

 

Oh, I am sorry! I tried to keep my post short. I
should have added that what I thought they were
receiving was what programs we watch -- not
that any individual was getting anything, but
that it was all loaded into a computer somewhere,
somehow. My point was this: not without my
pemission! Also, if they wanted it, what would
stop them from receiving it anyway from the
cable that brings the TVv in.

If someone was picking up on our phone
conversations, they would be quite BORED! 8o)

Thank you for the info. I think I will leave it
unplugged for a while, just to see what happens.
Although we have six or so cable jacks, only one
has a telephone jack as well. So far, after @ 1.5
weeks, everything has been fine, including the lists.