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Comment by smallgovt | Hacker News Reader

I'm genuinely curious why people are insisting on assassinating this company/CEO's reputation.

Selling anonymized user data is legal. In certain markets (like this one), any company that does NOT sell your data (and therefore charges their users), will be out-competed by companies that do.

Assuming there is a price to your online privacy (which most ppl clearly believe since they use Google) and the value this product brings to market exceeds that price threshhold, we're better off for it.

It seems to me the way to enact change is through legislation/regulation. And, anger towards any specific actor in this under-regulated field is misdirected.

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I don't get it either. Google reads your email to serve better ads. You grant unroll.me access to filter marketing campaigns. Now they read your email too. Selling anonymous purchase info is pretty benign given the amount of access.

The difference is Google doesn't sell the data to other people. You agreed to Google reading your email when you signed up for the service, with Google.

Its like saying, my travel agent knows my travel plans.

unrollme on the other hand was asked to do a specific task. And while they were probably really good at it, they took it upon themselves to be curious and find more information, black out some and sell that info to others.

Its like saying, you travel agent sells the data on what car you came in, what you were wearing and what you were feeling when you came to discuss your travel plans.

Horrible argument. Because others so something shameful does not mean you have to support someone who does the same thing. I would love to see Googles, M$, Apple, ... Reputation "assassinated" as well. And a lot of stuff is legal that is horrible and a hell of a lot of stuff is illegal that is totally fine. Like smoking a joint. So using legal/illegal as a argument is really bad.

If course laws that make this illegal would be great, still "uncalled for" is your opinion. I in fact call to public-ally shame every company who sells user data for profit. I am disgusted by "free" stuff. I would rather pay for something then to get something "for free". That why I have a payed protonmail instead of letting google read my mails to name one example.

This comes down to a value judgement.

To some people (like you), online privacy is of immense value -- seemingly almost an inalienable right alongside, life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness.

To others, online privacy has little to no value.

I'm somewhere in the middle.

Don't you think services like this should be freely available for people who don't value online privacy like you do? It doesn't seem right to project your value system onto others when both can peacefully co-exist...

A logical solution that would protect both parties would regulate the transparency by which businesses must communicate these data sharing practices. I just don't see the logic around why any company who shares user data is automatically evil and worthy of assassination.

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