Quote:
Originally Posted by labougie
Apologies if this is a repost, but when I asked VM exactly where in their small print I had authorised them to use my usage data as part of their revenue stream, they pointed me to:
Section 'G: Your details and how we look after them' of your terms and conditions which states:
"By having the services we provide installed in your home and/or by using them you are giving us your consent to use your personal information together with other information for the purposes of providing you with our services, service information and updates, administration, credit scoring, customer services, training, tracking use of our services (including processing call, usage, billing, viewing and interactive data), profiling your usage and purchasing preferences for so long as you are a customer and for as long as is necessary for these specified purposes after you terminate your services. We may occasionally use third parties to process your personal information in
the ways outlined above. These third parties are permitted to use the data only in accordance with our instructions."
Doesn't it seem from this that they've covered themselves and that we've all signed up to be Phormed?
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On the face of it, possibly, although I'm not so sure.
It says they can use your personal information "for the purpose of... profiling your usage and purchasing prefences".
Where's the "in order to subsequently provide advertising"? I don't see it there. There's no mention of what purposes the "usage and purchasing preferences" are to be put to. From the wording, the profiling is an end in and of itself. If they want to then utilise this profiling for something i.e. giving us adverts, then I'd say that would require a further change.
If they try to cover it under "to provide our services", then I'd argue that I never signed up for Phorm as a "service". I signed up for internet access, cable TV and phone services. Had Phorm been part of the package when I signed my contract, I would not have signed the contract.
I don't see how they can claim it's a "service update" either, it's the addition of a completely new layer of malware alongside the services we all signed up for.
However, the above would need to be argued about by lawyers, and my interpretation even to me is a bit nitpicky. Remember though, that you can refuse the right to all kinds of processing and collection under DPA, and that this refusal _overrides_ their Terms and Conditions. At worst, it means everyone has to actually issue a DPA notice nullifying their right to use this information in this way: I think Captain Jamie (?) had a pretty good letter on that one, although I haven't gone back to look at it.
I'd also be interested to know how long this exact wording was inserted in the Ts&Cs.