More from the Wall Street Journal on personal privacy issues. It is clear from this article just how much information can be amassed about individuals by private companies like RapLeaf, and also makes clear the power of groups who hire this type of company to target individuals. It is a kind of dystopian future not too difficult to imagine where politicians and advertisers are able to target unique hopes or fears or vulnerabilities or worse in order to get you to act in specific ways.
RapLeaf knows even more about Mrs. Twombly and millions of other Americans: their real names and email addresses.
This makes RapLeaf a rare breed. Rival tracking companies also gather minute detail on individual Americans: They know a tremendous amount about what you do. But most trackers either can't or won't keep the ultimate piece of personal information—your name—in their databases. The industry often cites this layer of anonymity as a reason online tracking shouldn't be considered intrusive.
RapLeaf says it never discloses people's names to clients for online advertising. But possessing real names means RapLeaf can build extraordinarily intimate databases on people by tapping voter-registration files, shopping histories, social-networking activities and real estate records, among other things.
