Tivo Users Take Heed

[acroyear]

Take this as a warning. Your viewing habits ARE being watched. You should go ahead and assume that the history of what shows you tivo and how often you watch them are already being catalogued and sold to advertisers and nielson-types.

All it takes is for some extension to the Patriot 2 act to turn Tivo into a "financial institution" and the feds could look at your viewing habits. At any rate, if the feds or the courts accurately assume they exist they can be subpoenaed for just about anything. Get accused of child porn or child abuse? they can subpoena your tivo records to see if, for example, you've been replaying baby diaper commercials or the like. Get accused of stalking, and they can look at your viewing records for a history of scinemax softporn. Such facts WILL come out and be public record, even if you aren't even charged; they'll be part of the grand jury testimony.

Two-way digital systems to corporations with a potentially "flexible" privacy policy are generally not to be trusted.

Comments

TiVo and Privacy

[landkurt.livejournal.com]

I understand your suspicion of having your every choice tracked and be used against against you at some later date. I was responding to what I see as a common over-reaction to tivo: "Oh my, they are tracking exactly what I watch and keeping records of it and there's nothing I can do about it". I apologized if that isn't at all what you were saying. However if that was what you were saying, I still disagree. I would say that everyone should be aware of what data TiVo is capturing and make up their own mind on whether they want one. You can always opt out of the viewing log uploads if that bothers you (and you take them at their word).

My position is that I really like TiVo and what it can do for your television watching. It's the greatest thing for TV since the VCR and is likely to have just as much impact if not more. I support the anonymous aggregate collection of viewing data, in part to support TiVo with another income stream and in part to have a small influence on what is shown on TV. I trust that TiVo is collecting the data anonymously, I don't see how it would be in their business interests to lie about it, there is little profit in precise tracking and a huge potential stink if it's found they are. I feel that there are much larger privacy issues than TiVo.

Just to get a handle on where you are coming from, would TiVo's opt out of data collection be enough for you? Do you trust them not to collect the data? Are you morally outraged that you even have to opt out of anonymous data collection? Does the thought that a company might make a little bit of money off of selling aggregate viewership data annoy you? I've heard people say "they're making money off of my data!" which is just wrong to me, you are represented in aggregate data every minute of the day, get used to it. No one cares enough to purchase records of exactly what you personally watch and I've seen no evidence that TiVo sells or even collects that precise information.

What I watch on TV is nearly a non issue. The largest privacy issue is going to be snooping on web access. A lot of dirt can be dug up on me or anyone by tracking exactly what web sites are visited and queries performed. There is a lot more underground content to catch someone accessing on the Internet. A quick look at the logs for our web server shows a few interesting things captured in the referrer string from the query page the user came from. Was someone really looking for a government fruit database when they queried for "arnold" and "nude"? I think you have a lot more to be worried about by having your ISP subpoenaed than TiVo.

As for watching porn on TiVo: the good porn isn't free. I've yet to see any cable or satellite system where you can subscribe to premium adult content or pay per view anonymously. The system always knows who you are simply in order to bill you. Those sort of records can and probably will be subpoenaed from time to time. I suggest buying your porn and other subversive materials with cash while wearing a disguise.