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Your Cell Privacy For Sale
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| ierxium |
So do you wanna know how many calls your former girlfriend made on November when you started to suspect something was up? Or do you want to know what people Ygrene called when he knew he had advanced to the second round of the COR Whore tournament? Well, you can, if you want.
| quote: | (CBS) Computers and cell phones have changed our lives, and a lot of those changes are positive. But such technology has a downside, including the erosion of privacy.
Now you can go online and buy other people's phone records – and it's legal, reports CBS News correspondent Mika Brzezinski.
Who you call, when you call and for how long – you might think it's your personal business.
But it's all for sale.
One woman, who asked us not to reveal her identity, says her jealous husband purchased her cell phone records for $89.95 and used them to spy on her.
"He basically just wanted to see who I was talking to, called them up, left threatening messages," she says.
Virtually anyone can be their own private eye with dozens of Internet companies advertising the sale of cell phone and landline records. Average price: about $100
They are called online data brokers and are largely unregulated by the government. The primary way they get their information is by simply calling the phone company and impersonating an account holder. With social security numbers and personal data so easy to track online, accessing almost anyone's account is simple.
Chris Hoofnagle represents the Electronic Privacy Information Center, which is calling on the government to prosecute data brokers.
"These records are even being purchased on police officers and FBI agents," he says.
In a complaint to the FTC, they accuse 40 companies of engaging in fraud, including BestPeopleSearch.com, owned by Noah Wieder.
"It's not illegal and it's a legitimate business," Wieder says.
Of the 40 companies we tried to contact, Wieder was the only one to agree to an on camera interview. He says services like his help track down criminals, deadbeat dads and runaway children. Furthermore, he claims he screens his clients.
Wieder says his company does its best to know clients' motivations.
"It's self regulated. It's just like alcohol. In the wrong hands, it's gonna be dangerous," Wieder says.
But some in Congress are working to change that, introducing legislation next week that would criminalize the accessing and selling of phone logs. But that is little comfort to the young mother who fears her estranged husband may still be tracking her every call.
"My privacy was sold," she says. "How is it even safe to have a cell phone?" |
-sourz
| quote: | I reported the other day that your cell phone records are on sale online for anyone to buy, without your permission. Well, this morning AMERICAblog bought former presidential candidate, and former Supreme Allied Commander of NATO (SACEUR), General Wesley Clark's cell phone records for one hundred calls made over three days in November 2005, no questions asked. (Clark's cell phone provider is Omnipoint Communications, which seems to be related to T-Mobile.)
All we needed was General Clark's cell phone number and our credit card, and 24 hours later we had one hundred calls the general made on his cell phone in November. The calls included a number of calls to Arkansas, to foreign countries, and at least one call to a prominent reporter at the Washington Post. To ensure that we actually had General Clark's correct cell phone number, we called the number this morning and the voice mail recording that answered said:
"Hi, this is Wes Clark, leave a message [unintelligible]."
We have subsequently called that number and spoken to a real person to confirm its authenticity, and to make sure General Clark was aware of this issue and what we were doing.
This is clearly outrageous. But let me first say, as an aside, that I bought my own Cingular Wireless phone records this past weekend and reported on it on AMERICAblog. I wouldn't do this to any other public person without first doing it to myself. But even after reporting on this gross violation of my (and your) personal privacy, Congress, the Administration, and the phone companies have yet to act effectively. (And they have known about it since at least this past July when the Washington Post reported on it.) So we decided to attempt to buy the records of a celebrity, so to speak. And we unfortunately succeeded.
I also want to say a quick aside about General Clark. I was a big fan of his presidential campaign, and he was the first candidate I supported. This effort was not meant in any way as a slight to the general. We wanted to see if it was possible to buy the phone records of someone high profile in order to prove that this is a problem with serious national security implications, and frankly, we didn't want to pick a Republican since we thought such a choice would be perceived as partisan or mean-spirited, and that is not our intent for exposing this. Our intent is to get this problem fixed so that we all can benefit.
I bought my records via the Web site LocateCell for $110. We bought General Clark's records via the Web site CellTolls for $89.95. It is possible that both sites are run by the same company.
Interestingly, we tried to get the cell phone records of other high-profile Washingtonians like ABC's George Stephanopoulos, the Washington Post's Dana Milbank, and the New York Time's Adam Nagourney, but LocateCell was unable to provide me with their records (possibly because those three use Verizon as their cell phone service, or possibly because LocateCell was on to me). We are in the process of trying to obtain additional records.
The following is the list we received from CellTolls detailing 100 consecutive phone calls either placed or received on General Clark's cell phone from November 15 to 18, 2005. The company only gives you 100 calls, then you have to pay more for additional calls. We have blacked out all but the last two digits of every phone number, including General Clark's cell phone number, in order to protect his privacy and the privacy of anyone he has been in contact with. This will permit General Clark, and at least one Washington Post reporter, to confirm that the record is legit.
The only question now remaining is why President Bush, our leaders in Congress, and our wireless phone companies (at the very least T-Mobile and Cingular, whose customers' records are available online to anyone) have known about this problem for at least six months but have yet to fix it.
PS CBS News is going to report on the cell records privacy scandal tonight (1/12/06) on their evening news broadcast. |
-sourz
If the president can do it, why can't the citizens? This is just messed up. |
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| tribu |
Oddly, I kind of agree ^^^
Is your privacy really being violated if someone knows what phone numbers you called? I think the answer if often no, unless you're harming some other person. I wouldn't necessarily be opposed to prosecuting someone who harassed the people on the other ends of those numbers, but if they just look them up to see who you're calling, who cares?
Besides, we have to pay for it, and we pay for the President to do it too :p |
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| ierxium |
| I do think your privacy is being violated, in all cases. It's like having a stranger come up to you and look in your cellphone and see what calls you made. Sure, there is no harm if s/he is just doing that but your privacy is being violated. Plus, the contract you signed guarantees your records will not be shared, your privacy is of high value to the company. |
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| tribu |
However, there is a market for these lists. And it's pretty easy to make sure you're not on them. For example, the company used in the Wesley Clark story could apparently not access Verizon phones. In other cases it might cost you a bit of money to be removed. The providers of these lists have created a market and they're running with it.
The police can get these lists at any time. You should be able to geth them for the police as well. |
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