Nordstrom may no longer be using Euclid to track smartphones, but other retailers are. And Ryan Grenoble reports that opting out may not be easy for some shoppers:
On its privacy page, Euclid assures skeptics it does not collect sensitive data, such as “who you are, whom you call or the websites you visit.” The anonymous data on individual shoppers that the company does collect is bundled with data from other individuals, resulting in an aggregate report of anonymous information.
Euclid has an opt-out option for shoppers who would rather not be tracked as they wander the aisles of participating retailers, though the process requires the user to look up his smartphone’s MAC address, a unique code that identifies the device to a network. (However, the MAC address is usually buried deep in the phone’s settings, and digging it out may be a daunting task for some users.) After a shopper opts out, his information is wiped from Euclid’s database along with Euclid’s record of the phone’s MAC address.
Read more on Huffington Post.
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