MY friends and I had a shock when we saw our full personal details, including name, telephone number and house address, listed under the online directory of Yellow Pages, owned by TM Info-Media Sdn Bhd. This means that anyone with access to the Internet is able to locate exactly where we live.

When I rang the customer service line to complain and to request for my private details to be removed, the person on the line simply told me that they got it from Telekom Malaysia (TM), and I would have to go to a TM outlet to de-register myself.

This practice is highly unethical, and places TM’s customers at great personal risk. For example, someone who is stalking me can easily find out where I live. I could be receiving harassing telephone calls by individuals who simply plucked my number out of the Internet. Or if I was escaping an abusive relationship, my partner can find out my new location without much trouble. In the least violent scenario, private companies can harvest such details with ease and subject me to spam.

As a company that enjoys a de facto monopoly over the country’s telephony market, TM has a duty to ensure that their access to customers’ data is treated with respect to our right to privacy. Right now, at least 4.6 million people in Malaysia who have subscribed to TM’s land lines are vulnerable to having their personal particulars accessible to an infinite number of people without explicit consent.

This practice has such a devastating effect on our right to privacy that such an assumption of consent is completely unacceptable. The potential risks need to be explained clearly — beyond a nominal insertion in the fine print. And permission must be acquired expressly prior to listing. The burden should not be on the customer when the responsibility lies with the company.

Further, customers reserve the right to be informed of what, how, where and to whom personal data shared will be used. Instead of being subjected to the whims and purposes of TM’s subsidiary, partner or outsourced companies.

This is common practice of all privacy policies with regard to communication services. TM really should know better.

As consumers and as individuals, we have a fundamental right to control access to our own personal data. Until TM learns this lesson, I would suggest that everyone with a TM telephone line to demand accountability from them.

Feel strongly about this? Talk back and share your views.

J.S.M.K, N.H. and E.M. Petaling Jaya

Source: NST – July 31, 2008