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What is Data Mining? Although data mining is a relatively new term, the technology is not. Businesses have used computer programs to sift through volumes of supermarket scanner data and analyse the market for years. However, continuous improvements in computer processing power, disk storage, and statistical software have radically increased the accurateness of analysis. This is how your Fly Buys card is matched with the online store. If you shop regularly at a large supermarket and use your Fly Buys card, then decide to use their online service, it actually shows you what you have been buying. This is supposed to assist you with your online purchasing, it actually makes up a favourites list for you….very scary stuff. Data mining" may lead to another process called "Weblining." Weblining is a process by which companies will grade each individual and base decisions about them solely in regard to the information they buy from companies. This can lead to different classes of individuals which will receive different offers from companies. Health insurance, higher education, employment, and financing could all be decided before you ever get in contact with an insurance agency, school, potential employer or lender, all based upon the information collected and compared by information aggregators. The lack of transparency and the size of legally collected data on consumers is not the only concern as these data brokerage companies are awfully attractive to cyber hackers. It is terribly unsettling to know that a business has such intimate particulars about you and your habits. Businesses generally take action to encrypt and protect your data to lessen the risk should any information reach unintended parties but what happens if there is a Data Breach? A cyber hacker who manages to successfully hack into a data brokerage firm, could potentially have personal data on hundreds of millions of people. With Congress struggling to pass any meaningful cybersecurity laws regarding protecting or collecting personal information from online consumers, it seems that, for now, the individual consumer can only hope his or her information profile doesn't exclude them from opportunities in life or end up in the hands of a criminal. "What is Information Aggregation and Why Should You Care?" was written by Sam Imandoust, Esq. He serves as a legal analyst for the Identity Theft Resource Center. We welcome you to post/reprint the above article, as written, giving credit to and linking back to ITRC Blog.