It doesn't make much sense and looks utterly paranoid. To me, all this "privacy" thing looks more like a hype than something of real importance, and the companies like Apple are taking advantage of such a mentality. Suppose you operate a store, what would you want to do? Obviously collecting information to improve user experience is only natural. Put it this way: If, at the end of the shopping, somebody from the mall approaches you and asks you to fill out a survey about your shopping experience and what could be improved, would you comply? Probably one half of us will. Then why, a method which is not intrusive, does not take your precious time, and doesn't waste human resource on the part of the mall, would get such a strong reaction of yours? Is it really the "rationality" you boast? I totally doubt it. It's more likely pretensive overreaction.