Sunday, March 08, 2009
Keep Verizon Wireless From Selling Your Data
A Public Service Announcement, if you are a Verizon Wireless cell-phone customer.
Verizon Wireless is currently sending out notification letters full of fine-print legalese to some of its customers. This notification only comes in the mail if you receive paper bills from VZW. Many VZW customers don't. You can read the whole document at
http://www.verizonwireless.com/b2c/globalText?contentType=Legal%20Notice&textId=181.
Short Version: Unless you opt out within the next 45 days, you agree that VZW can share a whole bunch of your private account data. Share, as in sell. And opt out, as in we'll be doing this unless you go to the trouble of telling us not to.
The personal data that VZW wants to distribute to anyone with a check includes: services purchased (including specific calls you make and receive), billing details, technical details, and location details. They promise to share this data only with 'affiliates, agents and parent companies'. They say that the data will not be shared with 'unrelated third parties', but I'm guessing that they define an affiliate as 'someone who has paid us'. Your data is given the descriptive name of Customer Proprietary Network Information, or CPNI. The document linked above does NOT state that the information they will 'share' is non-personally-identifiable, which makes me surmise that it is indeed specific, tied-to-you-and-you-alone. If you read the thing differently, let me know in a comment, but that's how it looks to me.
I won't even get into the whole "there oughta be a law" discussion about this sort of behavior. Insert your own spittle-flecked, profanity-laced rant here. To cut to the chase: here are a couple of ways to do the opting out.
Method 1. Telephone to 800–333–9956. Make sure you know your account's security password, as you'll need it to get past the menu. You also need to know at least one of the cell-phone numbers on your account (duh). You can opt out for all numbers on the same account with just the one phone call.
Method 2. If you have an online VZW account (and why wouldn't you?), log in at
https://www.verizonwireless.com/b2c/index.html. If you haven't yet set up an online account, you can do it at that same location.
On the red menu bar (see image at right), select My Verizon, and then click on My Profile on the flyout (ignore the second gray flyout to the left).
Here's where you will find the current status of your CPNI election. If you haven't previously told VZW to keep your data to themselves, the radio button(s) will be selected in the right column. Move them over to the left, and hit SUBMIT.
As far as I am able to tell, this only applies to wireless accounts, not Verizon landline accounts. I wasn't able to find a simliar privacy document/selection for my landline. But don't hold me to that as gospel, since it would seem to any reasonably cynical person (and I'm certainly one of those) that what goes for one Verizon snake-head goes for the whole poisonous Hydra.
If you'd like to let Verizon feel some of your pain, then instead of doing either of the above methods, telephone to a human at 800–922–0204 (6am to 11pm, presumably Eastern time). Make them explain their CPNI policy to you in detail, ask them a few time-consuming questions, maybe chew their ear off a little for their corporate evil rat-bastardness, and then tell them to opt you out. That will at least give you the satisfaction of having cost them half an hour or so in labor charges.
Sources:
Slashdot: http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=09/03/08/196242
Gizmodo: http://tinyurl.com/djv3lr
Addendum 3/9, 1750edt ...
ZDNet: http://blogs.zdnet.com/ip-telephony/?p=2649
Apparently this isn't new news. ZD's blog post goes back to Oct 2007. So maybe it's a recirculating net-meme, or maybe Verizon is giving it another try, but in any case it's still worth checking your VZW profile and making sure you're not letting them sell your data. FWIW, the ZD post has a scan of the paper document that comes with your mailed bill, and it also includes a polite nastygram that you can email off to the commissioners at the FCC.
Yet another 10/07 source:
http://networkinstruments.wordpress.com/2007/10/24/outrage-an-open-letter-to-the-fcc/
http://networkinstruments.wordpress.com/2007/10/16/outrage-verizon-wireless-to-sell-ads-on-your-cell-phone/
(if that link is too long, use http://tinyurl.com/2pmnbm)
And here's the NYTimes, which has the requisite lack of emotion in its reporting, plus it quotes some Verizon people on the subject of just what they are trying to accomplish (for what their word is worth):
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/16/business/16phone.html?_r=1&ref=business
And here they're catching up with the current spate of reporting on this topic, reposting information from ReadWriteWeb:
http://www.nytimes.com/external/readwriteweb/2009/03/07/07readwriteweb-verizon_customers_-_just_say_no.html?em (or http://tinyurl.com/dffdce)
I think they should link to this post for directions on how to opt out!
3/10, 1824edt... Verizon Responds. Let's make this very simple: anything involving private data should be opt-IN. Only. Period. Always.
Verizon Wireless is currently sending out notification letters full of fine-print legalese to some of its customers. This notification only comes in the mail if you receive paper bills from VZW. Many VZW customers don't. You can read the whole document at
http://www.verizonwireless.com/b2c/globalText?contentType=Legal%20Notice&textId=181.
Short Version: Unless you opt out within the next 45 days, you agree that VZW can share a whole bunch of your private account data. Share, as in sell. And opt out, as in we'll be doing this unless you go to the trouble of telling us not to.
The personal data that VZW wants to distribute to anyone with a check includes: services purchased (including specific calls you make and receive), billing details, technical details, and location details. They promise to share this data only with 'affiliates, agents and parent companies'. They say that the data will not be shared with 'unrelated third parties', but I'm guessing that they define an affiliate as 'someone who has paid us'. Your data is given the descriptive name of Customer Proprietary Network Information, or CPNI. The document linked above does NOT state that the information they will 'share' is non-personally-identifiable, which makes me surmise that it is indeed specific, tied-to-you-and-you-alone. If you read the thing differently, let me know in a comment, but that's how it looks to me.
I won't even get into the whole "there oughta be a law" discussion about this sort of behavior. Insert your own spittle-flecked, profanity-laced rant here. To cut to the chase: here are a couple of ways to do the opting out.
Method 1. Telephone to 800–333–9956. Make sure you know your account's security password, as you'll need it to get past the menu. You also need to know at least one of the cell-phone numbers on your account (duh). You can opt out for all numbers on the same account with just the one phone call.
Method 2. If you have an online VZW account (and why wouldn't you?), log in at
https://www.verizonwireless.com/b2c/index.html. If you haven't yet set up an online account, you can do it at that same location.
On the red menu bar (see image at right), select My Verizon, and then click on My Profile on the flyout (ignore the second gray flyout to the left).On the profile page (not shown), scroll down to Phone Controls, and find (copied verbatim): "Your privacy is important to us. You have ability to change your privacy(CPNI) Settings. View/Edit Privacy(CPNI) Settings" [You betcha your privacy is important to them, it's a revenue stream.] Click on the View/Edit link.
Here's where you will find the current status of your CPNI election. If you haven't previously told VZW to keep your data to themselves, the radio button(s) will be selected in the right column. Move them over to the left, and hit SUBMIT.
As far as I am able to tell, this only applies to wireless accounts, not Verizon landline accounts. I wasn't able to find a simliar privacy document/selection for my landline. But don't hold me to that as gospel, since it would seem to any reasonably cynical person (and I'm certainly one of those) that what goes for one Verizon snake-head goes for the whole poisonous Hydra.
If you'd like to let Verizon feel some of your pain, then instead of doing either of the above methods, telephone to a human at 800–922–0204 (6am to 11pm, presumably Eastern time). Make them explain their CPNI policy to you in detail, ask them a few time-consuming questions, maybe chew their ear off a little for their corporate evil rat-bastardness, and then tell them to opt you out. That will at least give you the satisfaction of having cost them half an hour or so in labor charges.
Sources:
Slashdot: http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=09/03/08/196242
Gizmodo: http://tinyurl.com/djv3lr
Addendum 3/9, 1750edt ...
ZDNet: http://blogs.zdnet.com/ip-telephony/?p=2649
Apparently this isn't new news. ZD's blog post goes back to Oct 2007. So maybe it's a recirculating net-meme, or maybe Verizon is giving it another try, but in any case it's still worth checking your VZW profile and making sure you're not letting them sell your data. FWIW, the ZD post has a scan of the paper document that comes with your mailed bill, and it also includes a polite nastygram that you can email off to the commissioners at the FCC.
Yet another 10/07 source:
http://networkinstruments.wordpress.com/2007/10/24/outrage-an-open-letter-to-the-fcc/
http://networkinstruments.wordpress.com/2007/10/16/outrage-verizon-wireless-to-sell-ads-on-your-cell-phone/
(if that link is too long, use http://tinyurl.com/2pmnbm)
And here's the NYTimes, which has the requisite lack of emotion in its reporting, plus it quotes some Verizon people on the subject of just what they are trying to accomplish (for what their word is worth):
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/16/business/16phone.html?_r=1&ref=business
And here they're catching up with the current spate of reporting on this topic, reposting information from ReadWriteWeb:
http://www.nytimes.com/external/readwriteweb/2009/03/07/07readwriteweb-verizon_customers_-_just_say_no.html?em (or http://tinyurl.com/dffdce)
I think they should link to this post for directions on how to opt out!
3/10, 1824edt... Verizon Responds. Let's make this very simple: anything involving private data should be opt-IN. Only. Period. Always.
