Nov. 27.2007
Friends,

This morning on NPR (National Public Radio) there was a feature article about TIVO and how your TIVO is to report many things about YOU and your viewing habits. Your 'report' is accurate to the second! Needless to say, the article really caught my attention...

For now your information is to be sold to NBC... the selling price for this information was not disclosed.

Your TIVO report includes *all* of the programs you watch/capture, the commercials you skip and those you watch. It will also include your age, income, race, demographics and location. Also included is the total time you have watched any network, program, commercial or *any* information your TIVO delivers to you!

Nielson does much the same thing, but for limited members/users and it provides hourly reports. This new TIVO effort should blow Nielson out of the water.

Now the thing that bothers me is HOW does the TIVO transmit your information back to headquarters? It would require a "uplink" method, phone calls or some other way to provide your specific data if that information is truly to be 'up to the second'?

BECAUSE it will go away soon (as programing changes), here is a quote from the NPR Site!

"NBC Universal has become the first major TV broadcaster to strike a deal with TiVo for the right to use the company's TV viewership research and interactive advertising products. TiVo now offers advertisers second-by-second ratings of programs and commercials and demographic data about the viewers themselves. Alex Cohen talks to Marketplace's Nancy Marshall-Genzer about the deal."

The audio link at the NPR Site has many more details, but I could not capture the link for you because it indicates a JAVA link?

RAT BASTATS!
555

That is crap, macromedia did something simalur several years ago for sony music. Sony had software included in there music cd's called DRM two years ago where when you played the cd on your computer it put SPYWARE to see what music you listened to, where it came from, if your burned it, who you shared it with, personal information about you, purchasing habbits, and sent it all back to sony. I think this is all crap! My personal infomation is mine, I will choose what I want to buy, what advertising I want to look at and so on...... TOTAL BS whatever happened to privacy?

privacy is so last century
now days you can see thru curtains or walls
turn any glass object or window into microphone
listen to any electronic transmitted conversation
and that is from your local mom and pop spy shop
the real expensive stuff is almost from the movies

Well there are very many ways multimedia companies can gather ratings information, Nielsen is by far the biggest. As for the Tivo, it can't report such information as age, race, household demos, and wages unless that info was given, and I don't believe they ever ask for that info. As for Nielsen, the Tivo will never ever come close to the amount of data the Nielsen Company gathers. Your comment that Tivo will blow Nielsen out of the water isn't the case it's the other way around. A quick suggestion is do a little more research before posting incorrect info that can be miss leading.

In this age nothing is private really. Unless you go to great lengths to protect yourself. Heck, even your firewall and internet 'security' programs report crap back about you that you aren't aware of unless you block them.

As far as tivo goes, I don't think they would have any way to collect all of that data, unless you provide it for them. Maybe the shows you watched/recorded, IF there was a data link of some kind, but age, race, ect. No way. :\

That is crap, macromedia did something simalur several years ago for sony music. Sony had software included in there music cd's called DRM two years ago where when you played the cd on your computer it put SPYWARE to see what music you listened to, where it came from, if your burned it, who you shared it with, personal information about you, purchasing habbits, and sent it all back to sony. I think this is all crap! My personal infomation is mine, I will choose what I want to buy, what advertising I want to look at and so on...... TOTAL BS whatever happened to privacy?

LOL. It was actually called XCP, not DRM. DRM stands for digital rights management, and the XCP system that Sony used on it's CD's was just one form of DRM. It also didn't do nearly anything of which you said it did. It wasn't malicious in the traditional sense, but was taking things MUCH to far. It installed without user consent, which is the biggest issue with it. It then installed a rootkit, for cloaking it's actions. Basically all the software did, was intercept all accesses of the CD drive.

There are MANY reasons why that was bad, but none of the reasons you listed were legitimate reasons, as it did almost none of that.

Well Mates... don't shoot the messenger.

Who honestly feels their personal information is private?

Anyone ever try to Google for a lost friend or used Classmates.com? Have you seen the many companies willing to help you find them for a few dollars (few dollars when compared to a P.I.)? They promise to find SO much information on them for you...

This includes social security, telephone, criminal record(s) in all states and more. I've never tried those companies and I've never seen the results or accuracy of a 'paid' search. The more you pay the more information is returned.

I am more than confident if you've ever voted, had a phone or been married, chances are there are records of you somewhere on the Internet.

There is a great book called THE INVESTIGATORS LITTLE BLACK BOOK that is FULL of information sites and sources! They also list many, many companies that do nothing but "person searches". In fact, PCWorld recently had a interesting article on obscure information sites... are you on them?

The truth is that we will never know *all* of the data collected in online and off line data bases. NBC is a huge and powerful company. Nothing stops NBC from subscribing to massive people data bases ~ and there are many!

I had a friend who worked for the phone company and THEY have LOTS of information on subscribers... trust me. You would be amazed everything that can be gleaned from a single page. Personal SS and DL numbers, late payments and more... and just think of all the information you gave them...

TIVO already has LOTS of information about you that may include your Social Security number or drivers license number. Do you recall the credit check you agreed to? What a great place to start hunting YOU down.

There are FULL CD / online databases have Census data about you. Again, it's nothing for NBC to buy or subscribe to this data and in fact, they almost get it FREE because it's part of doing business AND it's a tax write-off.

Do you remember ALL of the information YOU gave about your personal life you gave when you dutifully answered all of the questions for the US Census? Age/income/sex/numbers of people in the house ~ names, ages, income/married/single/divorced/education/cars ~ any of these things ring a bell?

Check out THIS site:
http://XXXwww.census.gov/population/www/censusdata/c2kproducts.html

*Somebody* has access to YOUR information and not just the broad-brushed area statistics. In fact one CD supplier says: 'Includes about 3500 variables and 11 boundaries... MSA and more.'

So if you think TIVO/NBC has no access to your personal information, I remind you ~ the emperor has NO clothes!

Pirate555

One Quick note NBC is only a peanut of a company compared to its owner General Electric with world wide access to information. I worked for them they new where the economy of the city I live in would be ten years in the future, they were bang on. GE has info on people places and things that would blow your mind and if they don't no the answer to the question no matter what it is they have the money and resources to get it.... Whatcha think!

Information Gathering by the TiVo Device

During TiVo installation, the installer connects the TiVo unit to a cable TV feed or other video source, a television, and the home phone line. The home user then controls the television exclusively through the TiVo remote control.

During an automatic daily phone call, the TiVo device gets a new copy of the most recent TV schedule from computers at TiVo headquarters. But during the same phone call, the TiVo device also transmits information to TiVo headquarters. At least two different types of information are transmitted: a diagnostic log file and a viewing information file.

Why would they

Well Mates... don't shoot the messenger.

Who honestly feels their personal information is private?

Anyone ever try to Google for a lost friend or used Classmates.com? Have you seen the many companies willing to help you find them for a few dollars (few dollars when compared to a P.I.)? They promise to find SO much information on them for you...

This includes social security, telephone, criminal record(s) in all states and more. I've never tried those companies and I've never seen the results or accuracy of a 'paid' search. The more you pay the more information is returned.

I am more than confident if you've ever voted, had a phone or been married, chances are there are records of you somewhere on the Internet.

There is a great book called THE INVESTIGATORS LITTLE BLACK BOOK that is FULL of information sites and sources! They also list many, many companies that do nothing but "person searches". In fact, PCWorld recently had a interesting article on obscure information sites... are you on them?

The truth is that we will never know *all* of the data collected in online and off line data bases. NBC is a huge and powerful company. Nothing stops NBC from subscribing to massive people data bases ~ and there are many!

I had a friend who worked for the phone company and THEY have LOTS of information on subscribers... trust me. You would be amazed everything that can be gleaned from a single page. Personal SS and DL numbers, late payments and more... and just think of all the information you gave them...

TIVO already has LOTS of information about you that may include your Social Security number or drivers license number. Do you recall the credit check you agreed to? What a great place to start hunting YOU down.

There are FULL CD / online databases have Census data about you. Again, it's nothing for NBC to buy or subscribe to this data and in fact, they almost get it FREE because it's part of doing business AND it's a tax write-off.

Do you remember ALL of the information YOU gave about your personal life you gave when you dutifully answered all of the questions for the US Census? Age/income/sex/numbers of people in the house ~ names, ages, income/married/single/divorced/education/cars ~ any of these things ring a bell?

Check out THIS site:
http://XXXwww.census.gov/population/www/censusdata/c2kproducts.html

*Somebody* has access to YOUR information and not just the broad-brushed area statistics. In fact one CD supplier says: 'Includes about 3500 variables and 11 boundaries... MSA and more.'

So if you think TIVO/NBC has no access to your personal information, I remind you ~ the emperor has NO clothes!

Pirate555

LOL, All census data is aggregated to the block group level or higher. Block groups inlcude 600 to 1500 people each. The 3500 variables are a rich source of aggregated info. The 11 boundaries are the different types of aggregate levels of analysis from block group to congressional district to the state level.

There are many ways to get personal info on you, but the census is not one.

darn it!

and i was thinking a bout getting one to go with my pansat3500sd box!

does any one know of ahack to past the credit card sign up thing???

i realy don't like to give out my credit card infor. to any one but online stores.and paypal!

one time i signed up to trey a new product i seen online and afew weeks later i head people talking about what product i tried out! and that i know it was a bank that did it!
gave my infor. with out my permisson!

so it's not just nbc u guys have watch out for. it's also banks.

when ever u use you bank card or credit card online they know.and are tracking your every thing you buy or sell.