Some things just need to be said...

Saturday, March 18, 2006

al-Qaeda, Diapers and Beer and the Canadian connection

al-Qaeda, Diapers and Beer and the Canadian connection.

It seems that a Canadian with a dodgey past is in some hot water because of an invention that can be used for all kinds of activities including some illegal applications.

Rencode is an invention by a Canadian man who had a tough time in school and even spent some time in jail for having some part in the design and placement of pipe bomb in a drug dealers car.

Rob Cattral as reported in the Globe and Mail is in trouble as his device has been used for shady purposes, ie to create illegal credit cards. His invention has been or is used by all sorts of folks, people that run gym clubs to the State of California's Department of Agriculture.

The invention reads and stores data that then can be used to keep track of information such as sales, receipts, product movement etc. The retail industry uses it a lot. They track what you buy, who bought it and what else you bought. So every time you come into one of their stores they can track what you bought, what time you bought it and can then see if there is any habits you have.

The al-Qaeda connection has to do with the making of credit cards that are fraudulent. Some guy came into Rob's business, Canadian Bar Code and Plastic Card Supply Inc. and bought one of these devices. This of course means to the authorities that bad boy Rob, he has a record after all must have known this was happening and as a result, is guilty of knowingly supplies the tools of the illegal trade.

Now that's not the scariest bit of information to be uncovered here. Not by a long shot, people buy guns for bad purposes, and we know gun manufacturers and retailors know this . That hasn't made them criminals yet.

The real scarey information is the ability to steal your privacy. Companies are doing it all the time. The best example to date is this.

When men purchase diapers for the kids, they are likely to pick up a case of beer too. Now thats cool information and I don't know if they start out to buy beer and then say oh yeah, should get some diapers too. Or they set out to buy diapers and then decide to get some beer.

I am curious though, it makes me wonder

Do Dad's that buy Huggies prefer lager and Pamper Dad's get pilsner? And do people that choose Genuine Draft pick up a store brand nappy or Luvs? I guess it Depends on the Dad.

Seriously though this is just the thin edge of a wedge that has many, including the Canadian and American government's wanting to know more about us and to do that they want to give us all little plastic cards to carry. The private sector already does this and its likely the bad boy the police are after, Rob, may have given them the tools to track all of us. Now if that doesn't make you wet your pants ...

No comments: