With todays multi-national, conglomerate, uber-corporations we too often see that in divulging our information to one branch we, in effect, give our information to all branches. How often do we see on forms little checkboxes asking whether our information can be shared within the company or with allied companies? How often are these checkboxes conveniently pre-checked for us?

Whenever my my wife and I fill out a form, under the second address line we'll put something like "#DM" to signify that we just applied to Dumbcrap Magazine. (Often we aren't even so cryptic. We'll put "#Dumbcrap Magazine" and the person copying over the data does so automatically.) Then we'll see whether that Magazine sold our name. It happens too often even when we specify that our name be sold. Yeah, we could probably sue but frankly we don't have the deep pockets like companies so the years and costs of such a lawsuit jsut aren't worth it.

Point being, that our privacy is under attack from many sides. Businesses are bad enough but how can we trust the Government to protect us when it, too, is in the Privacy bashing business.