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Walmart Means To Spy On Clothing Use
247wallst.com ^
| July 23, 2010
| Douglas A. McIntyre
Posted on 07/23/2010 9:36:19 PM PDT by Yosemitest
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To: Yosemitest
Jokes are usually funny. And, I don’t believe that you were not serious.
41
posted on
07/23/2010 10:53:01 PM PDT
by
jla
To: tlb
After helping out with aging parents, and working to overcome their confusion or scatterbrained doings, this could be a real problem.
If these things "beep" when going through the door, a swipe at the cash register doesn't always "kill" their sensors.
After a few minutes they can return to normal operations, if not "killed" properly.
How will you feel when they accuse your parents or grandparents of stealing,
because they forgot to remove a sensor from a tag.
And what if it's sewn into the garment, say the elastic band, or something similar.
And on a lighter note, what if my aging parent has an "accident", will the tracking sensor short out and shock them?
42
posted on
07/23/2010 10:58:39 PM PDT
by
Yosemitest
(It's simple, fight or die.)
To: Yosemitest
43
posted on
07/23/2010 11:01:04 PM PDT
by
Mojave
(Ignorant and stoned - Obama's natural constituency.)
To: Yosemitest
Many of these sensors also detect “beepable” items coming in the doors, for this very reason. I’d expect Wal-Mart to handle this situation pretty well because of their greeters. “Excuse me for a moment, sir, while I cancel your underpants... (quick pass with canceling wand)... Thank you, please enjoy shopping at Wal-Mart!”
44
posted on
07/23/2010 11:05:25 PM PDT
by
HiTech RedNeck
(I am in America but not of America (per bible: am in the world but not of it))
To: HiTech RedNeck
You got me laughing so hard, I dropped my water glass.
Luckily I didn't spill it on my 11 year old laptop.
45
posted on
07/23/2010 11:43:31 PM PDT
by
Yosemitest
(It's simple, fight or die.)
To: Mojave
46
posted on
07/23/2010 11:46:35 PM PDT
by
HiTech RedNeck
(I am in America but not of America (per bible: am in the world but not of it))
To: Markos33
Man, that’s thirty pounds of puddin’ in a ten pound bag!
47
posted on
07/24/2010 12:20:28 AM PDT
by
TheBlueMax
("Will kill foreigners so you don't have too!" U.S.Military)
To: Yosemitest
Chicks dig me because i rarely wear underwear.
48
posted on
07/24/2010 12:30:01 AM PDT
by
Nooseman
(mutt)
To: Eaker
49
posted on
07/24/2010 12:34:16 AM PDT
by
Salamander
(The Humblegunner that can be known is not the true Humblegunner.)
To: Eaker; shibumi
ROFLMAO!
[maybe he hates panty lines and loves the feel of leather on his bare arse, too]
:)
50
posted on
07/24/2010 12:35:47 AM PDT
by
Salamander
(The Humblegunner that can be known is not the true Humblegunner.)
To: Markos33
If I looked like that, I’d either starve myself for a month *or* buy a burka.
[eek!]
I’m amazed she’s not gracing the people of WalMart site.
[then again, considering I’ve gone into Wally’s wearing a black velvet caped Victorian maxi-coat and top hat and it *wasn’t* Hallowe’en, I’m amazed *I’m* not on it]....LOL
51
posted on
07/24/2010 12:40:27 AM PDT
by
Salamander
(The Humblegunner that can be known is not the true Humblegunner.)
To: shibumi
52
posted on
07/24/2010 12:42:04 AM PDT
by
Salamander
(The Humblegunner that can be known is not the true Humblegunner.)
To: Yosemitest
Isn’t this what their cash registers tell them? This seems like overkill, as well as an invasion of privacy.
53
posted on
07/24/2010 12:44:59 AM PDT
by
skr
(May God confound the enemy)
To: XBob; shibumi
“doctor will have to report your individual bmi (body mass index) (in other words, how fat you are) to the government, each time you visit the doctor”
I’m 18!
[and I LIKE it]....LOL
54
posted on
07/24/2010 12:45:05 AM PDT
by
Salamander
(The Humblegunner that can be known is not the true Humblegunner.)
To: Yosemitest
There is some concern that if the radio-powered tags are not taken off the clothing that the movements and behavior of customers can be tracked. OK if you are so stupid that you don't take the store tags off your clothes, then you should be tracked 24/7
55
posted on
07/24/2010 12:57:46 AM PDT
by
Oztrich Boy
(a 16 year old Australian girl already did it. And she did it right. - WWJD)
To: fhayek
Correction, some Americans and probably some illegal immigrants, and, quite possible, some legal immigrants and even some tourists are thieves. I have a POS system that told me what sold. I bet Wal-Mart has a far better POS system, so why do they want to spend more money on another system? Why slow down the checkout line for an unnecessary inventory procedure? It’s a far different thing to take home a barcoded tag then to be followed home by a tracking system. Someone is going to use that in a negative way.
Conversely, someone will probably base a murder mystery on the radio-chips and someone else will invent a radio-chip disabler. So, there may be an upside, after all.
56
posted on
07/24/2010 1:04:02 AM PDT
by
skr
(May God confound the enemy)
To: HiTech RedNeck
On a more serious note ... here's some more information.
Walmart Turns to 'Smart Tags' to Track Inventory
Friday, July 23, 2010
The retail giant Walmart will be attaching electronic ID tags to some of the clothing it sells.
The Wall Street Journal has reported that the so-called "smart tags" are part of a system to keep track of a store's inventory.
Wal-Mart said the tags will help reduce theft and counterfeiting, the latter particularly affecting prescription medicines.
Walmart officials at the company's corporate headquarters in Bentonville, Ark., refused to say how much the retailer is spending on the new technology.
However, some privacy advocates have concerns.
Even though the tags can be removed from clothing, they can't be turned off.
Anyone could pick up signals from them.
For example, if a tag is thrown into a trash can, anyone with a handheld scanner can find out what a person recently bought.
Walmart believes the tags represent cutting edge technology that could one day replace the bar code.
The radio frequency information or RFID tags will be placed in about 3,700 Walmart stores next month.
And from
WSJ.COM .... While the tags can be removed from clothing and packages, they can't be turned off, and they are trackable.
Some privacy advocates hypothesizethat unscrupulous marketers or criminals will be able to drive by consumers' homes
and scan their garbage to discover what they have recently bought.
They also worry thatretailers will be able to scan customers who carry new types of personal ID cards as they walk through a store, without their knowledge.
Several states, including Washington and New York, have begun issuing enhanced driver's licenses that contain radio- frequency tags with unique ID numbers,to make border crossings easier for frequent travelers.
Some privacy advocates contend thatretailers could theoretically scan people with such licenses as they make purchases,
combine the info with their credit card data,
and then know the person's identity the next time they stepped into the store.
"There are two things you really don't want to tag, clothing and identity documents, and ironically that's where we are seeing adoption,"
said Katherine Albrecht, founder of a group called Consumers Against Supermarket Privacy Invasion and Numbering
and author of a book called "Spychips" that argues against RFID technology."The inventory guys may be in the dark about this,
but there are a lot of corporate marketers who are interested in tracking people as they walk sales floors."
Smart-tag experts dismiss Big Brother concerns as breathless conjecture, but activists have pressured companies.
Ms. Albrecht and others launched a boycott of Benetton Group SpA last decade
after an RFID maker announced it was planning to supply the company with 15 million RFID chips.
Benetton later clarified that it was just evaluating the technology
and never embedded a single sensor in clothing.
Wal-Mart is demanding that suppliers add the tags to removable labels or packaging
instead of embedding them in clothes,
to minimize fears that they could be used to track people's movements.
It also is posting signs informing customers about the tags.
"Concerns about privacy are valid, but in this instance, the benefits far outweigh any concerns,"
says Sanjay Sarma, a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology."The tags don't have any personal information.
They are essentially barcodes with serial numbers attached.
And you can easily remove them."
They may really be something to worry about, here.
57
posted on
07/24/2010 1:04:53 AM PDT
by
Yosemitest
(It's simple, fight or die.)
To: TheBlueMax
Man, thats thirty pounds of puddin in a ten pound bag! You gotta be a country boy.
To: Yosemitest
I still say bunk to the idea that these are non cancelable tags, if only because the store’s periodic “inventory scans” would be skewed by wearers of past purchased tagged garments shopping or working in the stores, and because that would ruin their usefulness for catching shoplifters. As for having one’s tags sniffed in the trash, that’s a novel hack, but a garbage surfer could learn at least as much from the conventional paper and plastic packaging discarded by a consumer at home. In paranoid mode, flush the stupid thing down a garbage disposer to be ground to death. (Or even flush down the commode; who’s going to be screening your sewage before it gets to the main pipe? Or digging into your septic tank?)
59
posted on
07/24/2010 1:13:52 AM PDT
by
HiTech RedNeck
(I am in America but not of America (per bible: am in the world but not of it))
To: Salamander
[then again, considering Ive gone into Wallys wearing a black velvet caped Victorian maxi-coat and top hat and it *wasnt* Halloween, Im amazed *Im* not on it]....LOL Oh, you're on it. Maybe not at that particular time, but you're on it...
(No one escapes the Wal-Mart cam)
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