Anonymised Data

[Xpress Data]

Hi all

Keen to know your thoughts on this one.

Company A are a retail operation and want to know more about shoppers that visit their stores (time spent in each department and so forth).

Company B have offered to place monitoring units in company A's stores, which would then track company B customers in company A stores by their phone signals. Company B would be entirely responsible for the hardware and connections, which company A would not have access to.

Company B would then provide anonymised and aggregated data from the monitoring units to company A. It would allow company A to understand;

No of customers in each department
Demographic data and spend power
Interests based on what kind of products/ apps they've bought or downloaded from company B.

There would be no specific or personal data held or transferred across from company B.

So far as the data coming across from Company B is completely aggregated and anonymised, I'm assuming that company A are ok to use that data to refine their offerings to their customers.?

 

[fisicx]

Company B will be tracking my movements from my phone? This assumes that I am using Company B and I've given permission to be tracked. If neither apply then the data is going to be skewed.

It also suggests that the raw data will not be anonymized which means you need to see the GDPR/privacy policies for Company B to make sure they have the necessary permissions.

 

[Mike Kilby PC.dp]

Transport for London got a bit of a kicking for something just like this. Tracking peoples mobile phones through the tube network using Bluetooth or WiFi. it was deemed that it was an intrusion into privacy.

A large supermarket chain has also investigated using CCTV cameras to track people around stores.

It all comes down to the likelihood that the individual could be identified in future by the store/point of sale. If I go into the store and my mobile is tracked for location and I then visit the till and pay with a debit or credit card, that store can identify me and all my movements. it no longer becomes anonymous.