The Trojan horse

I recently went with my ID to buy an insulated pot holder.

We were given to believe that the requirement that we show our ID was purely to restrict quantities to 2 per customer.

The first clue that something was "off" was when they insisted that a valid driver's license was not good enough.

It had to be an actual ID.

Mr Khan who was running the show then took a picture of my ID card, Or scanned the 2D barcode. (both are equally invasive)

Either way alarm bells started ringing.

There is too much on that personal document that we should guard in this day and age.

He then asked for my home address and phone number, followed by how many kids I had and how many lived in my home.

The pot holders then insisted that I had to consent to the sharing of my personal information by clicking my assent on his device! Or I could pay 3 times more for the item I was sent there to buy.

At the time I assented, but in hindsight I should have just paid the premium or walked away.

Now, somebody out there has enough information about me, to impersonate me to my bank, or to harvest this information to dark web brokers who buy personal information.

Nobody else seemed too disturbed by being asked these intimate questions.

So I figured I was just being paranoid.

The story was that they were exchanging carbon credits and this was this that was being used to subsidise the discount.

I put it to you that the information collected about the Muslim community on that day would be hugely valuable to somebody who would sell it on.

The proof of this was that Mr Khan didn't simply accept that the cell numbers provided were true.

He called each number, and only when you showed him your missed call from him was he satisfied that the information was correct.

The lack of trust that this showed was odd from an information broker who wanted the Muslim community to trust him with their intimate personal information.

POPI anybody?