TRACKING – If you have a smartphone, look at this and gimme some info?
ATT Skeksi
VERIZON AND ATT ARE TRACKING SOME PHONES by inserting a piece of code into EVERY web request your phone makes. And the places you GO can track it, TOO.
(CLICK ON THE LINKS, THEY’RE REALLY INFORMATIVE!)
First, a terminology correction….this thing isn’t an “advertising header” (ATT), it’s a “Unique Identifier Header” (Verizon), in the sense that it’s tracking everything you do on the web, and providing that info to ANYONE able to capture the header (everyone), and allowing those sites to gather that data in one place and get a VERY clear view of you and what you do with your phone on the web.
After reading a great article about this that really kinda shocked me, I went to this site to see if I was one of the Lucky People That Get that Crappy ID TAG.
(Quick plug for an app that I use to aggregate news stories I’m interested in called “Zite“, this thing is the bomb for finding news I care about and I recommend it highly, tho it appears to cause SOME memory leaks on my phone according to an Apple Genius who plugged some little doo-dad into my phone at the store that told him all kinda cool stuff about my phone, and presumably me, since he didn’t want me to look over his shoulder and would NOT send me the report about MY phone, which I found really interesting, but that’s a whole other deal.)
I am being tracked, shocker.
However……
When I sent that link around to a bunch of people, I got back word that some of them were NOT being tracked –
what he said
THAT got me wondering why.
Why NOT track some people and track others?
Hmmm….well, one thing might be our political views and how vociferous about them we are. I’m extremely motivated and aggressive about my political views (drrrr), the other fellow not so much….so would that play into it?
And honestly, I don’t know. But one could easily imagine that in this time of technology and NSA spying and corporate governmental takeover and erosion of free speech via erasing of privacy, that such a thing would be a trivial decision to make by those whose interests lie NOT with the public interest, but with their very very extremely rich overlords, in order to find yet one more way to track/commodify/ensnare/intimidate/control/restrain us/me/you/everyone/anyone.
One thing I know, this is NOT OK with me, and I want it to stop ASAP. So I’m gonna get in touch with ATT and let them know I’ll be moving to another provider if that thing isn’t turned off and I mean NOW.
I’ll let you know how that goes….
(Another BTW, just TRY reaching out to ATT if you’re on their GoPhone plan, and not a month to month contract plan. You’ll immediately understand that they REALLY don’t like you not allowing them to rape you for every nickel and dime they can, if you DON’T know what I mean, click that link to find out how hard you’re getting screwed, it’s a doozy that most people still don’t seem to know. Here’s another.)
So I think it’s going to be very tough to even get someone on the phone about this issue, much more so to get it changed.
Another related note….ATT wants you to think that this thing is about identifying and quantifying you and your preferences for their advertisers, (which, if truly their ONLY motivation, is still WAY NOT OK with me. I’m not the least bit interested in subsidizing them making money off of me by PAYING to be followed around everywhere I go just so someone can SELL me shit I don’t want/need!! Are you fucking kidding me?!?!)
“Take advertising, for example. The whole basis of that industry is to mislead and manipulate, to create desire where none existed before. The concept of a rational consumer may have made sense a hundred years ago, but it was posited before the advent of two essential advertising tools — mass media communications and public relations psychology.”
My last point being, if they plan on using my habits/needs/wants/interests/friends/family/sexual stuff/etc etc, then they can PAY ME FOR THAT, and TELL ME THEY’RE DOING IT!! Maybe we’ll make a deal, much like Google does; you give me a free phone that you can make money off of me with by selling my very specific info, or YOU DON’T SELL OR TRACK ANYTHING ABOUT ME, and I’ll pay for the phone.
THAT seems fair, and would allow everyone their own choice in the matter.
But I digress, usually, and often…
Something else to mention here, and that is that ATT is ALLOWING you to “opt-out” of this tracking.
Well…….kinda…
As you can see, that’s a complete farce.
But this another kind of tracking, that’s what I’m talking about.
ATT has something they call ATT AdWorks Relevant Advertising, which is what they say this bit they stick into your http requests is for, and you can *allegedly* opt out of that, so let’s look at that…
ATT’s NON OptOut
As you see, it appears that this is a way to OptOut of their tracking you on sites….BUT…bullet points #2 and #3 make it clear that’s not the case, and that it will NOT get rid of the code they insert into your http requests, #2 because all it’s saying is that you’ll still be getting ads from them, they just won’t be designed to fit you based on the profile they will develop of you, (and NOT delete, I’d bet a finger on it), and #3 because they’re making it clear that whatever deal you make with ATT will NOT be honored by anyone else, so the implication is that the info will still be there in the header, and that the info will still be gathered by others, and further that ATT might not be using THEIR profile to send you tailored ads, but I’ll bet they’ll happily use OTHER company’s profile of you….to send you tailored ads….
ATT NON Opt Out
Net effect, you still get tracked all over Kingdom Come by everyone, but you feel like you aren’t being tracked because you “opted out”.
Nice.
And yes, a lot of people are that stupid or busy that they won’t pay attention.
So, you’re likely being tracked, in new ways that you haven’t been told about and likely wouldn’t allow if you were, and you can’t do a thing about it, unless you do.
Go to this site and find out if you have the tracker, then please let me know if you do or don’t will you? I have a feeling there’s more to this bit of code than just advertising, whatcha think?
UPDATE 5:15 pm 10/29 – It appears that opting out has worked for me at least, there is now nothing in my UID field at the testing site. YIPPEE!!
Hey LOOK!! Police scum…what a…..surprise…..? Really…?
I’m not surprised at all……are we gonna keep letting them do this?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1W0TrXf8i3U
Backstage on the set of Idiocracy…..
Not long ago a friend of mine used a phrase I hadn’t heard before – “The Angry Left”, and at the time I thought that was a very odd thing to say, given that almost all the shrill spit-flying anger I’ve EVER heard in Politics was from people on the right, and I’ve really never heard serious anger from anyone I know on the left…..in fact, I’M the one who is usually the angry one on the left, and I don’t really get that angry at people about this stuff, (mainly because I figure if they don’t get what’s going on, they must be challenged somehow, and I don’t like to make fun), so where is this angry left? (I now know that it’s a phrase the right has floated out there to give their base another canard-bomb to throw when someone starts using facts truth and other pesky stuff that needs to be obscured in a tidal wave of biley glue that you can’t get off your body without a shower, a bottle of toilet cleaner, and a belt sander.)
So where is the “Angry Left”….? Well, I guess it’s NOT in Strongsville, Ohio.
This is a place that National Geographic needs to go out and do some of their genetic mapping at, because I think we’ve found the “Missing Link“, or the extras from the movie “Idiocracy” at least.
Now I’ll grant you that the videographers in these clips must have known what they were gonna get when they started filming here, but if there is a Mother-Lode of dumbass knee-jerk redneck Stoopid-Is-As-Stoopid-Does Gumpaliciousness, this is the spot. Full of people who are just plain angry at……ummm…….well, I’m not quite sure what, but they’re REALLY ANGRY at any rate, and filled with inarticulate half or non truths that they’ve gleaned word for word from Limbaugh/O’Reilly/et al, these folks give new meaning to the phrase “Dumber than a Bag of Hair”.
Unless you’ve been living in your closet for the last week you’re probably already seen some of this, but since that’s possible, here’s some looks at what I’m talking about….
Ok, call me an elitist………..great, thanx. Now, if you were on Obama’s Secret Service detail, you’d be looking around a little harder in that part of the country wouldn’t you? Makes me a little scared for the guy, because THIS kind of thing gets a little past politics and gets into some, shall we say, “darker” parts of the human psyche. I mean seriously, do YOU know anyone who’s this angry on the left, (besides me of course) who doesn’t also chain themselves to trees?
Anyways, I’d love to see ANY evidence of this kind of nuttiness on the left, and be assured that I will put any vids that show lefty weirdness up, because it’s either real and I can say “Well, I was wrong” or it’ll be obvious BS and I can make fun of you in public….so send it in!
WB
Left Wing Media attacks eh?
So the media is supposed to be liberal?
How about just reporting facts and letting the whining fall where it may?
I’m wondering why it seems you can’t find any evidence on the national stage of all the shenanigans Palin has been pulling for YEARS in Alaska.
This woman is anything but what she says she is, and yet the hue and cry that would accompany these same type of revelations were they made of anyone on the left appear to be missing, instead the fawning and huzzahs are drowning out the bleating mewls of right wing hyena hypocrisy and lies.
Oddly, the only people I can find who really are getting into this stuff is 1) the actual truly liberal media (of which there is very little), and 2) Palin’s local paper.
So here’s some links to stuff you might not be hearing, and you really NEED to know, don’t say I didn’t warn you if this person gets into the White House by a vote (not to mention the old tried and true STEALING of elections, which has worked in the last two).
Palin refusing to cooperate with Alaska’s legislature on allegations of ethical and State personnel violations, after asking to be held accountable to any wrongdoing. Now that they are actually doing that, she’s trying to hold them off till after the election, when it won’t matter any longer. So now that SHE’S being investigated, she’s suddenly against the investigation and oversight by the legislature and doesn’t want any “housecleaning” done?
(BTW – I’m not making the case that the trooper involved in this mess shouldn’t be fired, it sounds like he’s a real piece of work. But there ways you do that legally, and there are ways to get it done that break the rules and the law. It appears that she chose the latter course and if so it speaks very clearly to all this talk about her being clean etc. Stonewalling the Alaska legislature like she’s doing gives you a very clear view of how she will behave in the White House……we’ve been seeing that kind of behavior for the last 8 years, and I well OVER it.)
A nice little wrap up of SOME of the things she’s been up to in Alaska….do you REALLY want this kind of person running the country? Really? Haven’t we had enough of people acting like a king in his castle, with the Oval Office containing a throne now?
Out of 74 stories at CNN talking about Palin, exactly 3 mention of any of this stuff she’s been pulling in Alaska in their headers, though I’ll admit more of them probably DO mention this stuff, but it’s clearly not a point they’re very interested in raising at CNN. (I use CNN as an example, since the right points at it the most…..since it would be REALLY tough to make that case against MSNBC or FAUX news, latter of which is simply a hard right propaganda dispensing machine).
Instead, after watching her speech, (which I thought was only sloganeering of nasty right wing radio host’s worst kind of pandering slander, with literally nothing but very nasty attacks mixed with self congratulations – I was literally shocked by it and found it reprehensible in every way) I was stunned to watch the commentators on CNN fondling themselves in paroxysms of almost sexual ecstasy at her speech, making it sound as though someone had just found the actual 2nd coming of Christ!
Liberal MEDIA? Are you HIGH?
Show me where they are getting into her record on the National level at any depth, step up and respond, and do it now.
Liberal media? Gimme a F**KING BREAK!
It’s the media’s job to report, these things are true, why isn’t it being talked about?
And BTW, anyone care about Iraq lately? Except for the families of those who have died there, and the people living there that are still dying daily?