A cell phone has multiple uses besides making a phone call -- it can send text messages, type an email and search the Web -- just to name a few. But, many people don't know their phone also acts as a device to inform retailers about a person's shopping habits.
Pam Dixon, the executive director of World Privacy Forum, a public interest research group in San Diego, said that consumers should be aware of what information their phone transmits about their activities and what stores are increasingly taking an interest in.
"It’s actually our phones that are tracking us. It’s like shopping with Big Brother,” Dixon said.
When a customer walks into a store these days, a phone can tell a retailer how many times that person goes into a store, how long they dwell in a certain area and similar topics of interest to the store. Dixon said there are light censors that create WiFi fingerprinting to gain this information and most retailers don't tell consumers they are doing this.
She said that it will soon dawn on people that they're being tracked when pop-up ads appear on a person's computer of an item they were shopping for and decided not to purchase.
Most consumers understand the need for security cameras, Dixon said, but few understand what new tools are beginning to be deployed.
“Few expect that the in-store video advertising monitor they’re watching … is watching them with a pinhole camera," she said.
