Dive summary:
- Privacy proponents are crying foul over Nielsen's new "topten" consumer app—which gives consumers to learn about the most popular TV, movies, books, songs, etc.—saying that the company is also using the app as a back door to collect data to sell to advertisers.
- A closer look at the privacy policy, which many app users don't take the time to read, reveals these words from Nielsen: "we use the information we collect to create a variety of research insights for our clients."
- Users can use the app without offering information, but the grayed out "guest" option is hard to recognize whenever the app asks you to create an account; the privacy policy is solid, but the marketing, including a 10-day bus tour to universities, continues to insist the app was created to help consumers first.
From the article:
"Users that create an account permit Nielsen to collect a user name, email, age, gender, zip code, and income (optional). If users elect, they can also link the app to their Facebook or Twitter account (Nielsen has data partnerships with both), which will give Nielsen additional information from the social sites. The company will also link the data it gets with other sources."
