Lois Beckett has an interesting news report on President Obama’s re-election campaign database. If you’ve contacted the campaign or used that site, you might want to read her coverage in the Tucson Sentinel. Here’s a disturbing snippet:
3. Is there any way to erase yourself from the campaign’s database?
As far as we can tell, no.
President Obama’s “Consumer Privacy Bill of Rights,” released last month, says that consumers’ right to control their personal data “includes a right to withdraw consent to use personal data that the company controls.”
The Obama campaign does make it easy to unsubscribe from email, text messages or newsletters. But we couldn’t find any way to take yourself off its database — and the campaign wouldn’t comment. There’s also no apparent way to see what information the campaign is storing about you.
Do as we say, not as we do?
How about some more transparency, Mr. President?