Is there a single big retailer out there that has not developed their own app? If so, they are a bit behind the curve because those that have developed apps and successfully deployed them must be enjoying some benefit as a result.
I am not sure how many TV commercials conclude with, “Download our app today!” but it sure seems like there’s no shortage of them. And this is coming from someone who watches very little television that includes commercials. In fact, the only television I watch that includes commercials is the evening news and when I do watch, I watch only the first 20 minutes of the local broadcast. That’s it! And even during that short period of time, I have seen numerous commercials from retail companies that conclude with a message encouraging viewers to download their app. I can only imagine how many I have not seen.
One thing I never forget with respect to big business is that they never do anything for the sole purpose of providing benefits to the customer. Everything they say, do, change, modify, tweak, “improve,” introduce or discontinue is done to benefit them. I’m not saying that’s either good or bad because we all know the main goal of any business is to generate profit. It’s just helpful to always keep that in mind.
Many companies are not content to rely on commercial advertising to promote their app and will offer customer incentives that rewards those that use their app. For example, junk food purveyor McDonald’s recently announced a new incentive that gives customers a free order of French fries on Friday if they spend at least a dollar on a purchase made via their app. You’d be far better off not eating McDonald’s French fries or any of the other garbage they pass off as food, but that’s a story for another day.
With that in mind, let’s think about why so many big retailers push the use of their apps. We know it is not done to make the consumer’s life easier or more convenient. That could indeed be a side-effect that many consumers value, but it is never the main reason. They do it because it benefits them and boosts their bottom line (profit).
Let’s use McDonald’s as an example although I do not doubt for a second that there are worse offenders out there in the corporate world. To understand what McDonald’s gains by customers using their app we only need to take a look at the ubiquitous “Terms and Conditions” that invariably accompany every corporate retail app. Who reads those things anyway? I get it. I’m as guilty as the next guy when it comes to not reading those insufferably long, dry and blindingly boring documents but if you want to get an idea of why a company wants so badly for you to use their app, it can reveal quite a lot.
Do you think they make those things so difficult and time-consuming to read by accident? That’s highly unlikely! They have an incentive to make those documents look as intimidating as possible because it’s a great way to discourage people from actually reading it. And it works very well. All you want to do when you see that intimidating wall of text is to click “I Agree” and move on with your life.
Checking out the privacy data for the Android version of McDonald’s app, I see that they have what amounts to a summary of the data the app collects at the bottom of the webpage but it seems a bit short on details. However, there is a link that leads to a much more comprehensive guide that reveals how McDonald’s handles privacy for most, if not all interactions with their retail outlets, discount programs, internet assets, digital products and so on. I think it is safe to assume that includes the mobile app so we’ll consult the more comprehensive guide with the hope of understanding exactly what kind of information they are collecting.
I was immediately drawn to the section that was specifically created for California residents since I know that state usually has more strict consumer protection laws and McDonald’s probably has to reveal certain things in that section for California residents that they do not have to reveal for those living in other states.
McDonald’s does not reveal specifically which of their data collection activities relate to each product or service but it is not all that hard to make assumptions that are quite likely to be accurate.
Firstly, they reveal that they collect data such as “Identifiers such as name, postal and email addresses, internet protocol (IP) address, social media handles, username, password and other contact information used to register and access McDonald’s products and services, log-in to Wi-Fi, enter one of our competitions, or contact us by phone or through our online services.”
A lot of that sounds pretty standard but my attention was drawn to the “social media handles” revelation. When I saw that I wondered whether that was data that the company specifically asks for in their app or website or whether their app or website is actually spying on customer activity by pulling data from other apps or websites that you use. Clicking on another link labeled “information we collect” cleared that up pretty quickly. Indeed, they admit they do spy on your other online activity. Specifically, they explain it as follows: “online activity on other websites, applications or social media.” Thanks for that, McDonald’s!
As expected, the section written for California residents is the most revealing. It’s important to understand that what they admit they are doing to California residents is being done to residents of other states as well. They probably just don’t have to disclose it in the same detail they are forced to use for California residents. I bet they would love to figure out a way to make that information available exclusively to California residents but have not been able to figure out how to do that yet.
What’s particularly interesting in the California section is this passage regarding personal information they collect: “Internet or other electronic network activity information, including, but not limited to, browsing history, search history, and information regarding a consumer’s interaction with an Internet Web site, application, or advertisement, as well as the information listed above in the section titled “Information We Collect & Process.”
So they are admitting that they may vacuum up your internet activity from any other site on the internet and grab your internet search history while they’re at it. Do you want McDonald’s obtaining a list of your internet searches? For that matter, do you want anyone except yourself obtaining a list of your internet searches? I didn’t think so. Who would? Jesus or Mother Teresa perhaps.
And what about text messages? Does the phrase “not limited to” indicate that they are leaving the digital door wide open and are essentially saying that they will read your text messages as well if they want? These days, text messages are likely to contain information that is extremely personal and private. Do you really want anyone but yourself reading all your text messages and other things you send via text, like photos, for example?
Speaking of photos, most people have a pretty impressive collection of photos stored on their phones. I suspect there are a few photos on just about anyone’s phone that they would not want to see posted on some public forum somewhere. I don’t recall anything in McDonald’s privacy policy that claims they won’t be accessing your photos.
They also reveal that the may collect your data from any entity in the “McDonald’s Family.” Oh, a family! Doesn’t that just make you feel all warm inside? Yeah, I didn’t think so. Anyway, who is part of the McDonald’s family? Well, it seems as if it could encompass quite an extensive and diverse cast of characters and who doesn’t love diversity, right? As McDonald’s tells it, their wonderful, benevolent family includes such entities as “McDonald’s Corporation and McDonald’s Global Markets LLC, and their affiliates, and subsidiaries (“McDonald’s Entities”), and franchisees of McDonald’s Entities, business partners, and vendors (e.g., food delivery platforms, data providers, or payment processors) or from public sources (e.g., your public social media posts).”
Wow! That is an impressive family! When one thinks about it, I suppose it could include almost anyone. How many organizations could be included among their business partners and vendors? I suspect that data providers and payment processors could include some very large and already data-bloated companies. And what the heck is a food delivery platform? Perhaps they are referring to companies like Uber Eats and Door Dash. Rest assured that they are all exchanging your data like tween girls exchange gossip about boys at a sleepover party. It’s one big, happy data party and you’re invited as long as you “agree.” The problem is that the theme of this party is all give and no take and you are the one that will be doing all the giving.
So what, you may think. I don’t know anyone personally that works in McDonald’s IT department and probably no one in any of their “family” of companies so what’s the big deal if they have so much of my personal information? As far as they are concerned I’m just a random name on a list of names that includes millions of other names. What harm can come of it?
Well, as far as what McDonald’s (and their “family” companies) does with your data, you may indeed have very little or nothing to worry about. It probably matters very little if some random corporate IT employee had a few chuckles over your internet search history. But what if the corporate IT people at McDonald’s HQ or one of their “family” companies are not the only ones that get to see it?
It’s important to realize that there were 3,205 compromises of personal information and consumer data last year that impacted a total of 353 million total victims, 2,365 more than the previous record. It appears that companies are not doing such a great job when it comes to protecting the personal information of their customers. That really shouldn’t be a surprise since data security is purely an expense for these companies. It is not an activity that helps generate profit so it may not be unreasonable to assume that it is an area where they really bend over backwards to do it as cheaply as they possibly can. As well all know, you get what you pay for and if companies are not willing to spend the money on top-notch data security, the likelihood that their data will be snatched by hackers greatly increases.
Hackers these days are interested in one thing and one thing only. Profit. Just like the big companies they steal data from! Oftentimes they will threaten to release the stolen data to the world unless the company pays them a ransom. In some cases data is indeed released and is accessible to anyone who cards to seek it out. How would you feel about your internet search history being posted on a site that just about anyone in the world could access? Admittedly, that’s unlikely. But it is not impossible. Ask the victims of the infamous Ashley Madison data breach. Many relationships ended and some customers actually committed suicide when their data from the company’s website became public.
I think a lot of people tend to forget about the fact that their cellphones are very effective trackers and that’s understandable. They have become accustomed to having their phones with them during virtually every moment of their lives and even I will admit that they can be incredibly useful. It probably does not take long for people to forget that their phones are tracking them wherever they go. I continue to be amazed by the number of people that bring their cellphones along when they commit a crime and that often makes it a lot easier for police to connect them to their misdeeds.
Although the companies the make the phones, write software, provide the phone service and write apps always seek to alleviate your concerns by promising that they will not misuse the data they collect about cellphone users, do you think you can really trust them to do is they say? I don’t know about you but I sure as hell don’t. Once in a while we hear about some company that was improperly using data they collect from their customers. Keep in mind that we hear about those instances only when they get caught red-handed. Think about how many times they are doing it and not getting caught.
By now it’s abundantly clear as to why companies are pushing so hard to get people to install and use their apps. They provide a gold mine of data that they can use to increase their profits. In some cases, they are selling that data to other companies so they can attempt to influence you to spend your money on their products and services as well. You may think that is fine and dandy and that is surely your right. Others are not comfortable with companies knowing so much about their personal lives. And when you reflect on what was written above about how these apps may be accessing things like your social media posts and internet search history, using the term “personal lives” sure isn’t an exaggeration.
By the way, don’t make the mistake of believing that apps are only tracking you or collecting data about you when you are using them. Apps tend to lurk in the background on your phone, meaning they are running all the time as long as your phone is powered on. There are various settings you can access on your phone to restrict which apps are allowed to run in the background but how many people bother with that or even know how to do it?
The benefits that companies enjoy as a result of people using their apps is the reason that almost all of them are free to download and use. Similarly to the way Google’s free GMail service gave them access to millions of email messages, companies are willing to spend money having apps developed and deployed for all to use because the data they obtain is well worth it to them.
There are also other things to consider beyond personal privacy. There have been occasions when apps that appeared to be trustworthy contained dangerous malware. How that happens probably varies a great deal. Hackers may have gained access to the apps before they were uploaded or perhaps they were able to exploit a weakness in a distribution platform such as Google Play and were able to insert the malware in an otherwise harmless app. However it happens, it’s another risk that you expose yourself to when installing apps.
Although most apps are likely to be harmless in the sense that they will not directly steal money from you, the same cannot be said for much of the malware that may be hidden in various apps. There was a time when hackers were content to exploit a program or online system for the thrill of it and for bragging rights but those days are long gone. The majority of hackers at work online today are in it for personal gain. In other words, their goal is to profit by stealing money from others. Malware hidden in otherwise legitimate apps could be capable of spying on other apps such as your banking, retail or other financial apps. The data they obtain that way could potentially be used to purchase items that are charged to you or worse yet, they may be able to transfer money out of your bank accounts and into their own.
I certainly have no expectation that any significant number of people will ever stop installing apps on their phones. That’s actually not what I am suggesting and will readily admit that I sometimes download and install apps on my phone. But I feel that I can guarantee that the number of apps on my phone is much lower that just about any average cellphone user you might encounter. I do my best to only install apps that I actually need or at least are clearly useful to me. I do not have a single retail store or banking app on my phone and I do not feel like that inconveniences me in any way. I do all my online banking and shopping on my PC where I feel that I have greater control and ability to monitor what is happening. For me, apps simply have too many hidden capabilities that allow them to deeply infiltrate my phone and do as they please without my knowledge. Sure, there always is the usual “terms of service” and “privacy policy” that accompany them but as we already discussed, do you feel that those can actually be trusted?
I am also not advocating a Woody Harrelson approach, but will admit that it does not sound like a terrible idea to me. I am simply suggesting that people think twice before installing the latest and greatest app that all your friends are using since it could save you from a lot of hassle and perhaps even financial loss. Consider if the little bit of convenience you may enjoy by using an app is worth turning over your personal and potentially very private information to some company that swears you can trust them (you probably shouldn’t).
Again, many of you will have no problem with that and I have no desire to restrict your freedom to do so. Just be aware of what you are giving up and consider the potential consequences before you tap “Install.”
P.S. I thought it would be appropriate and timely to mention a new data breach that was just revealed last week. In a massive (and I mean massive!) infiltration of AT&T’s systems, it is believed that hackers were able to access and download the records of the calls and texts of nearly every AT&T customer. Now, that’s one hell of a data breach! The company claims that no actual text messages or phone calls were accessed but is it hard to believe that a big company like AT&T would lie about such things? Please just remember that every app you install on your phone creates another opportunity for your data to be siphoned off of your phone and exposed to the world by hackers that infiltrate the systems that are used to store your personal information.