Anybody got the VIN of a junked/totalled 2001?

[Thelgord]

Honestly I am not really worried about it. Even my FaceBook is completely public. Knowing what I know has taught me to not stress about it, and buy insurance

[Stephen Biko]

Most people never experience an obvious downside to being hyper-tracked. Yes, you will get advertisements tailored to "press your buttons" (a nefarious example would be coupons for alcohol being sent to people with relatives who are alcoholics because its partly genetic and the alcohol industry makes 80% of their profits from just 20% of their customers so they are always looking for more alcoholics) but you aren't likely to experience direct and immediate harm beyond being suckered into spending money you wouldn't ordinarily spend. However those people who become 'interesting' will get screwed because Big Data is like a sword of damocles over all of our heads. Don't win the lottery. Don't run for public office. Don't get involved in a protest movement. Don't witness a rich person commit a crime. Don't piss off the wrong person. If none of that kind of stuff ever happens to you, you'll probably be OK.

But its really hard to predict what might make you interesting. I mentioned the company ChoicePoint before. They became infamous for basically lying about felony records to get people thrown off the voter rolls in florida during the 2000 presidential election. Roughly 8000 people were illegal prevented from voting because of that 'error.' It was a real life Buttle/Tuttle scenario. Those people would never have considered themselves "interesting" but they were and they had no practical recourse, what was done could not be undone. This stuff is insidious and incredibly non-obvious.

Y33TREKker, were you referring to that incident about 3 years ago when the chinese grabbed nearly everything from the Office of Personal Management, including all the SF-86s? They got my clearance info too. It was a massive security failure. And that sort of thing is an entirely separate risk. All the big companies, especially the Big Data companies themselves, are juicy targets. But at least those hacks are illegal. Its all the legal uses of my information that really concern me because its not about straightforward crimes like draining bank accounts (which are FDIC insured) its about doing sneaky stuff that benefits them at my expense for which there is no recourse, or if there is recourse its more expensive than the losses - lawyers are expensive AF.

Taking a precaution like asking my mechanic not to enter my VIN into their computer is low-cost and easy. Maybe it won't make a difference. Maybe that data would never be used against me in the first place. But if I can do it, I'd be a fool not to do it. There are so many other precautions that take so much more effort.

[Y33TREKker]

Y33TREKker, were you referring to that incident about 3 years ago when the chinese grabbed nearly everything from the Office of Personal Management, including all the SF-86s? They got my clearance info too. It was a massive security failure. And that sort of thing is an entirely separate risk. All the big companies, especially the Big Data companies themselves, are juicy targets. But at least those hacks are illegal. Its all the legal uses of my information that really concern me because its not about straightforward crimes like draining bank accounts (which are FDIC insured) its about doing sneaky stuff that benefits them at my expense for which there is no recourse, or if there is recourse its more expensive than the losses - lawyers are expensive AF.

One and the same yes, which is how I ended up with the ID monotoring service in the first place. As I said, it just seemed odd that after this long those instances would show up.

And if any such instances were occurring because of an enemy I'd ever made in political/wealthy/etc circles (who was trying to put me on the defensive by suggesting I was being watched), I'd just consider it fair game anyway since I frequently use my online personas to remind those types of individuals I'm watching them too.