Community
The owner of your favorite restaurant may be tracking your every move—via your smartphone. Not because he’s a snoop, but because he believes knowing when and where you go for entertainment will benefit his business.
And how did he pull this caper off? There’s are companys out there, that place sensors in businesses within a confined location to track shoppers as they ambulate about town.
The sensors track signals emitted from Wi-Fi-enabled mobiles. The mobile-user’s movements in daily life create a profile of that user. Gee, how invasive is that?
The business owners with these sensors justify the invasion by using the profile knowledge to promote their business. But are you cool with that?
Another sensor technology analyzes actual foot traffic patterns onsite. Large retailers you visit sometimes have these sensors, following your every move in the store. They might know if you are pregnant, have the flu or have a hot date that night. They will send you offers based on your needs. Some say this is kinda creepy.
It’s a booming business: tracking peoples’ daily movement patterns via their smartphone. But you can relax somewhat, because this technology does not reveal any names, just movement patterns. Still, it’s something you should be aware of.
But don’t relax too much, because some of these same services will run free Wi-Fi services on site or at local coffee shops and restaurants that people can log into with Facebook—doing so will reveal their name, age and social media profile.
Phone tracking is a godsend to business owners, however, because they can create promotions based on profiles: E.g., upon learning that most clientele are over age 50, a health club might decide to play mostly ‘70s music.
Nevertheless, as phone tracking booms, privacy concerns also boom. Do you want someone to track all your doctor visits, then sell this data to marketers based on what disease the tracking profile thinks you have? This seems to be where it’s all headed.
Companies in the U.S. still are not required to get your permission to collect and share your data for the most part. But you just never know what may come next.
Some helpful Information
This content is provided by an external author without editing by Finextra. It expresses the views and opinions of the author.
Sergiy Fitsak Managing Director, Fintech Expert at Softjourn
14 August
Oleksandr Strozhemin Co-founder and CEO at Trinetix
13 August
Elaine Mullan Head of Marketing and Business Development at Corlytics
12 August
Abhinav Paliwal CEO at PayNet Systems- A Neo Banking Software Platform
Welcome to Finextra. We use cookies to help us to deliver our services. You may change your preferences at our Cookie Centre.
Please read our Privacy Policy.