This is assuming I could trust the people who ran the service to not abuse the data (and I probably wouldn't trust any such service, so it's a moot point).
No, I don't, but in the first case, I don't use the phone for anything I wouldn't want broadcast on the front page of the New York Times (not because I don't trust the phone company, but because I don't like talking on the phone), and in the second case, I *do* trust my ISP -- my ISP is just this one guy and he seems pretty cool -- but of course I don't trust every ISP that owns a server that a packet might travel through on its way to my inbox. But in that case, I kind of have to go with it in order to use email (unless I want to encrypt everything, which makes it harder for other people to communicate with me, etc, etc, and isn't necessarily foolproof). In the case of the locator service, I'm not really sure how much benefit I would derive from it (I get along fine without it now), so I have little incentive to acquire yet *another* entity that I Just Have To Trust.
In summary: postmen read postcards. It's one of those things. Advertising companies like to know about demographics. In as much detail as possible. So knowing that someone goes to the corner shop at 4pm is useful, to somebody.
But in a situation where you -can't- trust information transfer services, you either make do, or live like a crazy person.
While I fully expect individuals to go snooping about and see what information they can look at, in general I don't expect companies to do so. At least not large ones that care about their reputation.
This isn't because I think they're nice - but because companies with any intelligence know that eventually secrets leak out. And that when they do people get very upset and the Data Protection people jump on you from a great height.
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Do you trust your domain provider not to read your emails?
Do you think that the people running such a service have much to gain from knowing that you're in the local corner shop?
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2] I assume that they do
3] Yes.
In summary: postmen read postcards. It's one of those things. Advertising companies like to know about demographics. In as much detail as possible. So knowing that someone goes to the corner shop at 4pm is useful, to somebody.
But in a situation where you -can't- trust information transfer services, you either make do, or live like a crazy person.
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This isn't because I think they're nice - but because companies with any intelligence know that eventually secrets leak out. And that when they do people get very upset and the Data Protection people jump on you from a great height.