Think it goes back earlier than that, well not everything, but position data, which is bad enough, but the 4g 5g etc upgrades keep knocking the cars off from being able to phone home.
Never get a shopper card from any grocery store. That is how they track your shopping habbits.
If the store takes a phone number, use the old standby 867-5309 More often than not, someone will have already registered that phone # to get discount prices, but it won't be tied to one unique person.
They can just use your credit card number or your cell phone signal. But by all means keep subsidizing my groceries because the card saves me easily $500+ per year.
I can't find exact mention of it but I believe they use cellphone signals to track individual customer movement within a store, so as a supplier you can get analytics on how many people stopped to look at your new cornflakes box redesign or whatever. This is in addition to all the usual website and cookie tracking that everyone does. And it's all integrated - I remember hearing that if you stop and look at a TV in walmart, and then go browse the internet, you might get targeted ads for that specific tv.
They have all sorts of data on predicting purchases based on local weather or even individual changes in behavior. Target made waves a while ago by being able to figure out if you're pregnant by what kind of soap or supplements you buy. All without a scary barcode card.
In the grand scheme of creepy things companies can do, figuring out what groceries to stock and what coupons to send me is pretty mild.
But if they start charging me extra for being white, I will EMP their whole store.
Despite being the largest chain outside of Walmart, if you live in Oklahoma, Idaho, the Dakotas, Nevada, or the NE seaboard, you may have grown up having never heard of "Kroger", but maybe you saw their other brands.
So you are going to steal things, but choose to stand in line, and then in front of a high res digital camera pretending to ring things up, instead of just walking out the door? Sure, why not. Make sure to do this at a store with a heavy police presence while you're at it.
I don't know what you're talking about. I'm just a silly little guy that makes mistakes like anyone else. I'VE never been trained on any of this sophisticated equipment. I'm trying my best out here.
You know that guy you see post on reddit, saying that he was getting away with stealing, and then 3 years later you see him complain that he did prison time because Target/Walmart was watching the whole time and handed the evidence to the police once it went over the limit for felony grand theft?
As far as I know, the "change prices based on your face" thing was proposed but never implemented. I think there would be viral videos of it in action if it were true. Also a device such as this https://youtu.be/CNx1lA2eMYg?t=106 could probably disable them handily.
Wait till you find out what car and life insurers are using your data for.
My 1999 Honda Accord is a priceless treasure to me.
THe ones that use google being the worst
Think it goes back earlier than that, well not everything, but position data, which is bad enough, but the 4g 5g etc upgrades keep knocking the cars off from being able to phone home.
Never get a shopper card from any grocery store. That is how they track your shopping habbits.
If the store takes a phone number, use the old standby 867-5309 More often than not, someone will have already registered that phone # to get discount prices, but it won't be tied to one unique person.
Carrying you cell phone into the store will probe for wifi hotspots (even if you "disabled" wifi), and will use their unique identifiers to do so.
I think one of my phones actually had random MAC addresses by default to my surprise.
They can just use your credit card number or your cell phone signal. But by all means keep subsidizing my groceries because the card saves me easily $500+ per year.
Walmart and HEB are the cheapest near me, by far, and they don't use cards.
Kroger has stuff they don't though.
Walmart has advanced analytics program that includes pre-purchase behavior. https://www.walmartdataventures.com/
I can't find exact mention of it but I believe they use cellphone signals to track individual customer movement within a store, so as a supplier you can get analytics on how many people stopped to look at your new cornflakes box redesign or whatever. This is in addition to all the usual website and cookie tracking that everyone does. And it's all integrated - I remember hearing that if you stop and look at a TV in walmart, and then go browse the internet, you might get targeted ads for that specific tv.
They have all sorts of data on predicting purchases based on local weather or even individual changes in behavior. Target made waves a while ago by being able to figure out if you're pregnant by what kind of soap or supplements you buy. All without a scary barcode card.
In the grand scheme of creepy things companies can do, figuring out what groceries to stock and what coupons to send me is pretty mild.
But if they start charging me extra for being white, I will EMP their whole store.
I have some friends that don't care, so I use their numbers for discounts.
King Soopers = Kroger fyi
Same thing with Smith's.
And Harris Teeters (which has majorly declined in quality since the Krogers takeover).
And Fred Meyer.
And more.
Sounds like it's once again time to look at the map of US grocery chains. Here's one from ChainStoreAge: https://assets1.chainstoreage.com/images/v/max_width_2600/s3fs-public/2024-01/grocery_2023.png
All the purple states are "Kroger Banner" stores.
Here's a more recent one using k-nearest neighbor analysis to show the "influence" of each store in a region: https://flowingdata.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/grocery-store-chains-in-the-US-1090x829.png
Despite being the largest chain outside of Walmart, if you live in Oklahoma, Idaho, the Dakotas, Nevada, or the NE seaboard, you may have grown up having never heard of "Kroger", but maybe you saw their other brands.
Suddenly really glad the Kroger in my town closed its doors a few years ago.
As if all the other grocery stores aren't developing the same thing...smh
I'm sure the discount at the self check out will more than make up for any fluctuations
So you are going to steal things, but choose to stand in line, and then in front of a high res digital camera pretending to ring things up, instead of just walking out the door? Sure, why not. Make sure to do this at a store with a heavy police presence while you're at it.
I don't know what you're talking about. I'm just a silly little guy that makes mistakes like anyone else. I'VE never been trained on any of this sophisticated equipment. I'm trying my best out here.
Uncle Leo over here
You know that guy you see post on reddit, saying that he was getting away with stealing, and then 3 years later you see him complain that he did prison time because Target/Walmart was watching the whole time and handed the evidence to the police once it went over the limit for felony grand theft?
You are probably that guy.
I stopped shopping at Kroger when I read they sponsor trooning out children.
It's been a few years, so I don't remember where I read it.
As far as I know, the "change prices based on your face" thing was proposed but never implemented. I think there would be viral videos of it in action if it were true. Also a device such as this https://youtu.be/CNx1lA2eMYg?t=106 could probably disable them handily.