It’s 1970. You walk into the store, grab a bunch of apples, go to the cash register, pay with cash, and walk out.
What kinds of data have been automatically processed about you while doing that? Very little. Most likely, none, as CCTV footage relied on the development of VHS to be viable, and IP cameras transmitting video over networks only took off in the 90s.
Fast forward to today. Depending on where you live, your supermarket has good cameras everywhere; some, like the super fancy new experiments, have recognition technology that detects what items you grab so that you can just pay without scanning, or even just walk out, having it subtracted automatically from your account. This isn’t just Amazon stores; German store Rewe is trying to get into that too, as I know someone personally who works in their sub-company Lekkerland’s “Smart Store Rollout” department.
A more mundane but very common thing for the big stores is tracking you with RFID technology: They track where you are and how long you stay at specific spots by using a network of fixed RFID readers via the RFID tag on the loyalty card or shopping cart (or the individual scanners Rewe offers nowadays!). By noting the time and location of each tag read, the system can create a map of your path and duration of stay within the store.
Your supermarket might also have an app to get specific sales and offers. Mine, for a little period, even made it seem as if you could only buy specific products if you pay through their app instead. They dropped that after a while, but I’m sure it got many to download it and make an account - as, of course, you could not use it without one.
At the checkout, you might opt for self-checkout now. I’ve seen that stores in the US distinctly record your face and your hands scanning the products, so in case you try to sneak something, they have clear proof and identification options. That video gets analyzed and stored for a while.
Either way, you might use a loyalty card you signed up for with your real name and address to collect points or get a discount, tracking exactly what you bought, and you’ll likely pay via card. Your bank account has a bit more information about where you shop and when than if you had just withdrawn cash. If you’re like me, you also pay contactless via phone or watch, giving the processor like Google Pay or Apple Pay some info as well.
All that for quickly getting something at the grocery store, something that would not have given the companies much meaningful data about you specifically even just 55 years ago. Of course, some of these things are avoidable and no one forces you to use apps, bank and loyalty cards, but still. These things are not presented as the data harvesters they are, but as convenience and a way to save money or time, targeting vulnerable groups the most.
But why even go to the store? Maybe you live in a country with delivery options like Instacart and the like. One more service related to the groceries you buy that is an app, a user account. What if you can’t or don’t wanna cook? Just get a delivery via DoorDash, UberEats, Lieferando or the equivalent in your country. More data about you, and that’s just food.
What if you aren’t buying apples at the grocery store, but you’re buying lamps, frames, or a new bed cover? Nowadays, you’d most likely either have a similar shop experience as in the grocery stores, or you’ll online shop on the company’s website or app, that may or may not also show ads and place tracking cookies or reads other data on your phone. They might get you with a 5% off coupon if you just sign up for their newsletter! So you do. Not many use a throwaway mail address or immediately unsubscribe. Now they have constant access to you and your attention if they want to, not just while you’re at their physical stores. A marketing email popping up at the right time creates desires and a suggestion to do some online window shopping, again creating data as you use their website or app. And then there’s the shipping companies…
What about the news? You can still buy magazines and newspapers at the store and the corner shop/kiosk, or maybe those little newspaper vending machines that drop one if you put in a coin. But everything is moving to digital nowadays, saving waste and printing costs, so to read the same newspaper online, you have to either pay with your data or pay more than print used to cost, and even then, still pay with your data.
Subscribing to the digital version or unlocking a single article via a one-time-payment still tracks you and still shows you ads on many, many news sites. And what do you pay for? If you’re unlucky, it is the same article copy pasted across 10 different newspapers, or a completely AI generated article with zero human effort. For comparison: Just buying the print at a coin vending machine leaves them completely in the dark about you. That was just normal.
I notice this in all kinds of industries and parts of life now - it’s why everything now requires an app and a sign-up. Your local café, your hairdresser, your e-scooter. Hell, I even saw nailbiter nail polish now comes with an app. New washing machines and refrigerators are reporting back to their companies.
Why is every place, every product company now accepted to be a data aggregation company as well? Why is my data the cookie jar that companies frequently get their hand stuck in while acting entitled? Hello, I already paid you, why are you not ashamed of your obvious greed?
What tires me about all of this is that we are supposed to pretend this is all normal and as if it has always been that way, and pretend that this isn’t just double-dipping.
I pay money, and then I also generate money with my data. In cases of the loyalty cards and discounts, you could say that there is a fair trade as the price gets lowered, but this is the minority. The majority of the time, we are tracked and profiled with no advantage for us, no compensation. And even if there is, and default pricing is higher if you don‘t share data, that ends up being financial discrimination and affects your choice significantly.
As prices rise everywhere, paying with our data gets us almost no relief and is just an ever-growing additional income stream on the side for these companies. Despite having this pile of digital gold to pad their wallets, they still pretend that they have to raise prices all the time for all kinds of situations, and then never lower them when they resolve, as the profit of doing so and selling to advertisers and AI companies is concentrated at the top of the chain.
Companies used to be fine selling via means that did not track and invade your life this hard, now we’re supposed to pretend these things are essential. Essential for what? More ads? More manipulation? Better sales numbers? More money for the CEO?
They are not essential. We could drop 3/4ths of these mechanisms with no discernible changes to the user experience or product access. The reality is that literal essentials are gatekept by being subjected to this constant harassment and evaluation.
How long until not complying with this surveillance regime downright hurts?
When you cannot pay cash, or you cannot get into the store without scanning a QR code via their app for authentication, or pricing is personalized based on the profile they have about you - compiled with not just the store data, but other data they bought from data brokers? Your loyalty status, past purchases, your income information, credit score, propensity-to-pay algorithms, Meta social media info, …? Premium loyalty tiers where you ironically pay for more privacy? Predictive technology wrongfully classifying you as a high risk for stealing and banning you from the store?
I’m tired of every niche jumping on this opportunity to be the next Cambridge Analytica. You are a hardware store, not a data broker company! I keep swatting your hand out of the jar, but you are just back in there every time I look.
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