Sometimes it pays to forget the hype about one-to-one marketing and look at the reality.
Yes, consumers have more choices than they did 20 years ago. But they are more likely to have their identities stolen or to suffer in some other way from the negligence of corporate America.
That’s the way it looks after a month of headlines about security lapses at several companies. These episodes have led to predictable grandstanding by legislators, and could bring about restrictive legislation. (See our great coverage by Richard H. Levey, starting on page 1.) And don’t think the Republicans are going to save us.
They may follow the corporate line on bankruptcy and tort reform, but on privacy Republicans and Democrats alike sound like Naderites.
But let’s revisit the scandal that set all this off: ChoicePoint. Of the many stories that appeared on it in February and March, the one that rattled us the most was on MSNBC. It stated that privacy advocate Deborah Pierce had obtained a 20-page
