Auto-diallers are actually illegal in the uk, however all a company need to do is buy auto dial services from the states. the autodialling is done from there and then switched on connection to a uk call centre.
There\'s not many places you can hide these days in the world of data collection.
how did they get ians number clare?? quite simply they will have bought it either from his exisiting mobile phone servivce supplier or the company he bought the phone from.
you can but any amount of info if you want it. things like loyalty cards in supermarkets. theya re not a gimmick to give you favours, they are a superb method of gathring info. everytime you use one, the full list of everything you bought, total spend, date etc is recorded and over the months a profile of you is built up and you will fall into several categories of consumer, the list of which the supermarkets will then sell to marketing companies. eg all procter and gamble need to do target some junk mail for pampers is ask tesco who\'s sorted buying baby products etc.
credit card companies do it as well. every time you use your credit/debit card, details of your spend are kept, and the sold on to the highest bidder.
If I wanted I could go to one of several companies, and get a full list of every single item you have purchased and where from in the last 12 months or more, all you telephone numbers, earnings bracket etc etc
all perfectly legal as long as the company holding the dat has registered with the data protection registrar
the data protection act is a complete joke, if you believe it offers you, the consumer any protection.
the basic premise of the dpa is that yes you are entitled to see information that anyone might hold about you, but is nigh on impossible to enforce, but gives the government the right to see all your computer records whenever they fancy. Its perfectly ok for you to sell data as long as yo hve registered with the dpa. supposedly you can demand to see your data by sending a written request, with a nominal fee (no more than 10 quid) to a company, and they have to send you copies. This also covers cctv. Go do a dance in front of the local police station then go in give ema tenner and demand a copy of the tape. It really pisses them off but the old bill do comply (been there done that!) as for companies like dunn and radsteet (one of the worlds biggest data collection agencies) they worm out of it by holding there data off shore, so technically claim expemption. They cannot legally do this under the terms of the act but it would involve court action to do it, which nobody could afford anyway.
the act was amended last year and now even includes written records so if you think that by writing stuff down a bout people rather than holding it on computer you\'d be safe think again.
do a google search for info about the echelon project and then be afraid, be very afraid.
The DPA couple withe regulation of investgatory powers bill (2000) are 2 very scary pieces of legislation if you actually care about civil liberties.
take a look at the cookies that are present on your computers, for example. yo will have several from place you have never heard of. some with just an IP address some from sites such as bilbo, advertising.com, double click.net, adclick.net and many more. These cookies have recorded every web page you have ever looked at, how long you were there, where you got it from and where you went to next and added this to the pile of info they already have from credit cards, loyalty cards, phone bills, etc etc etc. Stop using Internet explorer asap and use something that will give you full control over cookies and the data they deliver. I proxy all mine via 10downingstreet.com or cia.gov just for a laugh!
enough to turn you into a ludite
Theres currently some exploratory work going on looking at call centres in India. It would appear that on the face of it banks/BT etc have acted illegally in exporting data to these countries without the tacit approval of the data protection registrar and may have breached the RIP act
personally I can\'t wait for the next installment of the \'so-big\' virus to bring em down
one last bit of fun you can have is when you are phoned by these eejits, especially if they are in the financial sector, ask for their address first and then inform they are being charged for this call. write them a letter informing them of your charging structure (registered post) and then a few days later send them and invoice for the call!
