It is 1) an invasion of privacy and 2) anti-competitive behavior.
Version 1 may be easily circumvented, but future versions could easily be tighter and more difficult to circumvent. For example, a contract with the mobile providers could make this something that no longer depends on in store WiFi usage.
This is the sort of thing that should be stopped in its infancy.
As with anything, if you aren't paying for it then you are not the customer.
Now, if they somehow convinced Verizon or ATT to interfere with the network access that I am paying for, that would be a problem and I'd stop doing business with both the carrier and the retailer.
Considering the plethora of choices, you would definitely win. /s Goes back to old George Carlin joke about belonging to a club and you not being in it.
Carlin's bit, for reference. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cKUaqFzZLxU
But I completely agree with you - if you're getting a free connection, look for the attached strings.
I'm not so sure here. This patent only applies to Wi-Fi connections onto the Amazon owned network. So the client device must first broadcast their SSID (public), request access to a private network, then request data through the Amazon router (Inspected/Firewalled by default). It's Amazon's prerogative to block ports or IPs at their discretion as every router or VPN does.
2) anti-competitive behavior
It's definitely anti-competitive in spirit if they reduce information access to competitors - whether it's legally anti-competitive is probably a gray area and my guess is that the patent filers have already taken that into account.
Now I can understand if it said anywhere that it would actual tamper with traffic then it could be illegal, but as it stands it just says it might block or redirect them. Sounds like a pretty standard firewall to me.
Do they do it to block bandwidth hogs like video streaming sites (and "think of the children!" content, in schools), or is that coffee shop blocking review sites, info about competitors, etc? I think that what they're blocking and why is more important than the fact that they're doing some blocking/redirecting in the first place.
As the owner of Mimi's Cafe, I don't see why I can't block you from looking at AT&T's plans, or impair your Netflix.
So you're basically saying that if I'm using Starbucks' WiFi it's surely their prerogative to read my emails or whatnot ("inspect" my traffic)
That said if you're doing email over bare HTTP then you're broadcasting that data publicly over RF anyway.
[1]http://searchnetworking.techtarget.com/definition/stateful-i...
This is why https is a thing.
Where do you draw the line with that? What if you were in a store, saw a product, and then asked the clerk 'can I use your phone I want to check the price at one of your competitors?'. Is that any different? Even if the phone line doesn't cost anything per call (it's a fixed cost let's say).
Competition, honest competition, doesn't require you to make it easy for customers to see if your pricing is fair or high or whatever. Mostly if stores don't enforce this (even with taking of pictures) it's because from a practical standpoint they can't enforce it or get employees to battle customers. Not because they don't have a right to do so.
That seems to be the spirit of anti-trust law:
The categories of prohibited conduct are not closed, and are contested in theory. Historically they have been held to include exclusive dealing, price discrimination, refusing to supply an essential facility, product tying and predatory pricing.
So in this case it could be argued that they are "refusing to supply an essential facility." That essential facility being unrestricted access to the internet - but I think its too precedent laden to hold.
After all, perfect information is a condition of perfect competition (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perfect_competition)
"The one thing a capitalist fears more than anything else is a truly free market."
Future versions could also be more malicious, such as modifying the price or even availability of the item on a competitor's website if possible.
This is why we need to keep supporting both technical solutions such as VPNs and https, as well as political solutions like net neutrality.
What about the corollary to this - marking down a price in store for a specific shopper. This is something I've read about in regards to in-store tracking. A system could detect when you're likely to purchase something given some sort of incentive, and provide an on-demand coupon to your smart device.
Not really. It's only effective on their own wifi network. Disconnect and you're good to go.
> Future versions could also be more malicious, such as modifying the price or even availability of the item on a competitor's website if possible.
That would have serious legal implications, so I don't see it.
> This is why we need to keep supporting both technical solutions such as VPNs and https, as well as political solutions like net neutrality.
Or, you know, turn off the free wifi they are giving you?
> Not really. It's only effective on their own wifi network. Disconnect and you're good to go.
I don't understand how this response relates. It's still a huge ethical issue even if those people who are aware of it can learn to avoid it.
> That would have serious legal implications, so I don't see it.
I'm not as optimistic. ISPs have gotten away with modifying websites in the past, not as maliciously as this. But it's a step down that path.
> Or, you know, turn off the free wifi they are giving you?
Obviously I myself am not going to use the wifi. But I don't think just telling everyone you know not to use in-store wifi is a good long-term solution.
Those people should read TOS's. But seriously, don't connect to an open WIFI network expecting privacy.
Saying this isn't anti-competitive because customers can always ignore the free wifi misses the point: given the service issues in stores and the attractiveness of (usually) higher speed wifi, people are going to be drawn to it and no one is going to read the Terms & Conditions that say "Hey, we're going to try to prevent you from shopping for the lowest price!"
Also, it'd be legal to intercept or block traffic. It wouldn't be legal to change a competitor's website.
That's not much of an argument in the context of patents, because the sole purpose of patents is to prevent competition. All usage of enforceable patents is inherently anti-competitive behavior.
No, the purpose of patents is to make trade secrets into public information so knowledge isn't lost; allowing inventors limited monopolies isn't the purpose, it's the cost, it's the carrot that achieved the goal of getting them to disclose their inventions to benefit all of mankind. You've confused the carrot for the destination.
While this is already occurs for content that is considered illegal, broadening the content it can be applied to is dangerous.
They may block or throttle their competitors, or send you promotions for their products (or do the same things of their associates). Many people won't know or be able to detect that this is happening.
Amazon doesn't seem to be too concerned with how anti-trust law might be interpreted. I think they'll just count on the impotent FTC not having the resources to bring a case against them.
The problem I see is that they are fine doing it to others with their app, but not ok when it's done to them.