L. Tood Masco:
Perhaps one could generate a privacy crisis by collecting that information and conducting a mass mailing to every person in the database: "we have this information on you. So could anybody with $125. Call your congress critter and complain."
This is a wonderful, wonderful idea. The biggest blow to privacy in this decade was when Lotus Markeplace was withdrawn off the market. This ifnromation is already widely distributed. The only effect the withdrawal had was keeping the public in the dark about what infromation is out there in the world about them, and (by inference) how it was obtained. The sad fact is, most of the political action over 'privacy' only has the net effect of keeping people in the dark about what information they are giving out to complete strangers about themselves. Most people don't realize, at either gut level or fully at the intellectual level, just how much personal information they are giving away when they write down their Social Security or other universal ID number on a form. As long as the information is only being swapped between skyscrapers, so that most peple aren't allowed to access it, this ignorance will contininue. People will realize what they are doing when it's sitting in front of their faces on the computer screeen. I also highly recommend using anonymous remailers to post allegedly personal, but in fact widely available, information to the net such as credit card numbers, credit histories, medical data, and the like -- as long as viable alternatives for the victims are available. Timing is critical here; let's be ready to do this but not jump the gun until the alternatives are available. Let's promote real privacy, technology that gives customers real knowledge and choices about what data they give out, rather than the current bankrupt political movement which promotes information theft from ignorant consumers, and the hoarding and monopolisation of information, in the name of 'privacy'.