Mobile phone

The Sun-Times broke this stunner: It doesn't matter whether it's your land line or cell phone, this company has your privacy for sale.

All Search Results:

* 1 to 4 hours during business days on orders received by 5pm
* Guaranteed to be accurate, and current
* No data returned, No Charge for the Search

Reverse Cell Phone Number Lookup $65

Find Name and Address from number. Additional Cell Reverses available including Canadian Cell $85, and International Cell $250.

Find Current Cell Phone Number $95

Give us the name and any combination of address or SSN and we will send you the working cell phone number.

Cell Phone Call Record $110

Give us the cell phone number and we will send you the calls made from the cell phone number.

They do the same for your land line.

John Aravosis tried it out, and for $110 he bought his own phone call list. It was all there.

I called Cingular and they were shocked by what I told them - yeah right.

And the best part? The article from the Sun-Times makes clear that the FBI is aware of this problem, the Chicago Police Department, one of the top two electronic privacy groups in the nation (EPIC), and even the office of Democratic Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NY). EPIC apparently has known about this problem for a long time, and Schumer didn't seem very surprised either.

Says Pam Spaulding at Pandagon:

My first thought on the ability of the average Joe to obtain your cell phone logs is that this revelation must send shivers down the spines of those working in the domestic abuse field. How many women will die as these “services� become widely publicized? How many people will find that their stalkers and freakshow neighbors/coworkers/employers will be helping themselves to information that you thought was private?

Gee, if you’re gay and don’t want someone to know it, this sort of crap may result in the closet door being kicked open for you. And if you’re HIV+, well, this is one easy way to lose the privacy of that information if you call a hotline or AIDS services clinic. Toss HIPAA out the window.

Why wasn’t closing this Holland Tunnel-sized hole in privacy on the radar when the Violence Against Women Act was reauthorized on the Hill? Certainly Congress could have held hearings to explain the gravity of this. Why not?

They are in the pockets of the telecommunications giants that trade and sell your information and these Repugs aren’t about to worry about your rights.

The BS is that Congress knew about this since last July when the WaPo ran an article about this, and Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NY) called for legislation to criminalize this crap and it’s been wasting away. That’s something, but why on earth isn’t there hell being raised?

Good question. John adds:

Hell, Bush could have evoked his apparently all-powerful divine right of kings and simply outlaw the damn practice - a much better use of his dictator police-state powers than spying on innocent Americans.

But Bush did nothing. Republicans and Democrats in Congress did nothing. And the FBI and the privacy groups have known about this for a long time, and they did nothing.

This is the kind of issue that you could get fixed on Capitol Hill IN ONE DAY. But that would require someone who actually understands politics, who understands how to get things accomplished, and who gives a damn. It also takes someone who isn't in the pocket of the telecommunications industry, the telemarketers, and the direct marketing lobbyists.

And finally, let's not forget the biggest criminals of all in this affair. The phone companies. There is no way that these online services are outright stealing this information, if they're able to get in just a few hours consistently. They've got access to the info, and from the reading I've done it seems the cell and land-line companies are selling our info for profit. So, the biggest slap in the face should be to any phone company out there who has ever sold one big of information about you to anyone else. Not only is it unethical, but they just might have helped Al Qaeda. Congrats.

This needs a blogswarm.

Thanks to Wonkette who thanks Fleshbot (they're like family, those two) who thanks Remy for this tip: There's a new service available to deal with the frustrations of unreliable cellular service. The lovely gals at Smash My Phone will stomp the crap out of your cell phone.

This seems to be one of those jobs that would indicate more sensible shoes.