alphac2005
Well-Known Member
Please consider the following:
“The real danger is the gradual erosion of individual liberties through automation, integration, and interconnection of many small, separate record-keeping systems, each of which alone may seem innocuous, even benevolent, and wholly justifiable.” - U. S. Privacy Study Commission, 1977
Fundamentally, the line crossed with MagicBands is that I am being tracked as an individual. Yes, Disney could hire 100,000 CMs whose sole jobs were to follow all park guests but, obviously, this is impractical just as it is impractical to track thousands of individual guests via surveillance cameras. However, technology has reached the tipping point where all of us, as human beings, can be tracked 24/7.
The 4th Amendment protects us against unreasonable searches by the government without probable cause. The Supreme Court has already unanimously ruled that tracking devices constitute a search. The Privacy Act of 1974 establishes the laws determining how the government collects information about us, while the Right to Financial Privacy Act of 1978 provides similar protection to our financial records. However, the 4th Amendment and the two privacy acts do not protect us from corporations. There are few checks in place for private corporations.
If left unchecked, I expect our society to reach a point where corporations require us to wear tracking devices as the price of doing business with them. If that seems ludicrous, consider that in 1977 the concept that I'd have to wear a tracking device in order to visit WDW would have been unthinkable. (And I don't even want to hear about the bogus "opt out" option.) There would have been many who would have ridiculed the idea. Seriously go back and contemplate the quote from the 1977 U. S. Privacy Study Commission. Commission members would be shocked at how much of our individual liberties we've already surrendered to technology.
MagicBands cross the line. MagicBands don't track my data; they track me.
I don't want my children living in a world where The Gap scene from The Minority Report is the accepted norm.
Bingo.
What many people don't seem to understand is that our Constitution has mechanisms to protect the public from government interference, prying eyes, etc. (Although there is a quite the erosion in those departments.) However, it does not have anything to do with corporations, the private sector. Only when we get legislation to restrict some of the absurd "gone too far" policies do any of these companies get any true legal pushback.
Let me give an example to everyone of how pervasive all of this technology is. I've owned a mail-order company for the past decade and a half. Our company is accessible via catalog, phone, and the Internet. When a customer comes to our company's website, we can in real-time access data including the following on what is considered to be an "anonymous" visitor:
IP address - So, we can see your location most likely within a couple of blocks of your actual spot
City location, which is tied to the IP - Although we also get triggered when an anonymous IP is used
Connection speed
Age demographics, sex
OS you're using, monitor size or mobile device that you are using
The exact keywords and original link of origin into our site including specifics of the method of how you got to us and/or why
Every single thing that you've typed into our system
Every single page that you've visited
Where you are in the process
My people can actually push chat right into your anonymous visit (Something we don't do, but have easy access to)
How many times you've visited, last time, length of visits, etc.
I'm sure that I'm missing some items, but you get the point. Those data points are available on just any visitor onto the website and obviously becomes much more detailed once converting that individual into a customer. My company has a very strict privacy policy that in our industry is basically unheard any longer. I've been told that we're essentially foolish for not exploiting all the data that we get in and using it to our business advantage, but I guess there are some of us that still have that little thing called ethics.