The Secret Service and Yellow Tracking Dots in Printers

I was happy to receive an email today from freelance journalist Theo Karantsalis. Since 2010, he's been trying to get the US Government to fess up about which printer manufacturers they are in cahoots with.

Readers of my blog may recall an effort I made a few years ago to get Lexmark, the printer company, to fess up to using the tracking dot technology. It eventually worked - they admitted it.

Theo's Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request has revealed the other side of the story: the US Secret Service sent him an official list of ten manufacturers that have "fulfilled or agreed to fulfill document identification requests submitted by the Secret Service... using machine identification code technology".

The manufacturers are:

• Canon
• Brother
• Casio
• Hewlett-Packard
• Konica
• Minolta
• Mita
• Ricoh
• Sharp
• Xerox

In other words, these manufacturers have helped (or have agreed to help, in the future) the US Government identify individuals through the near-invisible secret dot pattern that their colour printers print on every page. Lexmark didn't make the list, even though they have the dot technology enabled. 

For those of you keeping track: the government AND the manufacturers have finally fessed up: "yes, this tracking dot technology is a real thing and we use it". So it's not a secret anymore, right? Well... maybe with all the digital privacy issues these days, paper privacy issues don't get precedence. If we can't communicate privately on paper, how can we expect to communicate privately online? 

Theo's news post

FOIA request on Scribd

Brahm's Yellow Dots cross-post

Food For Thought: Cellular Data Roaming Charges

I spotted an article last week about a Regina man who incurred $10,600 in data roaming charges from SaskTel when he travelled to Phoenix, Arizona and let his grandkids watch Netflix movies over a mobile data stick for his laptop.

The man in the article was honest about his mistake and I'm not going to judge him. What I think is ridiculous is the extremely high data fees he incurred, and how they were dealt with. The article says:

"[The man] followed up with SaskTel which decided to take mercy on him and promised to reduce the $10,668.38 bill by $9,600."

That's good PR for SaskTel, but I think it highlights the worthlessness of data fees on mobile devices. While cellular carriers do incur expenses creating international roaming agreements with carriers worldwide, the $9,600 bill reduction demonstrates that data fees are mostly pure profit for telecoms.

In other words: SaskTel gave up $9,600 in pure profit to get some good PR by taking mercy on a grandfather, but their roaming data rates (and the rates of their competitors) will remain sky-high to scalp profits from ignorant consumers.

I'm not villainizing SaskTel - cellular carriers all over the world do this. So be careful with your smartphones, tablets, and mobile data sticks while travelling!

WestJet, BIGOTZ

The last flight I booked on WestJet had a confirmation code that - I suspect - evaded the filter that prevents the F-word and other unsavoury words from being injected into confirmation codes:

I mean, BIGOT isn't a swear, but it's not an attractive word in the least. I wonder if some ugly-but-not-profane letter combinations are filtered out of the six-letter-confirmation-code generator, like OLDHAG and DUMBAS and FSCKYU. I'd like to see FUNTME and MMAGIC and WIZARD as confirmation codes instead.

The last crew I had on WestJet was so awesome. Three male and one female crew members; all funny and energetic. They completely transformed the boring safety routine and mundane passenger announcement into something funny, or at least attention-grabbing. Lines like:

"We'll be landing shortly, so our crew will be coming through the cabin to collect any garbage, phone numbers, jewelry, or money you want to leave with us," followed by the crew member silently mouthing the words as the French version of the annoucement was made. Or, a crew member telling a guy, "Look, you have to put your Kindle away for take-off. I know it's a stupid rule, but Transport Canada makes it, not me". Much respect for acknowledging it's ridiculous! (see my previous rant on this)

It was a really fun, fresh flight. It made me completely forget how bitter I am about lots of stupid airport rules, so I hope this cabin crew attitude spreads!

Banking Pro-tip: Automatic Fund Transfers & Multiple Savings Accounts

I have a banking pro-tip that I've been using for a little over a year now. It's nothing revolutionary, but I really like how it works and wanted to share.

My goal is to save pockets of money for infrequent but significant expenses: travel, gifts, and charitable donations. I bank with RBC, so I created a (completely free) e-Savings account for each of these expenses so that I wouldn't be pooling all of my savings in one big chequing account (which makes it too easy to forget about savings goals).

For instance, Robyn and I love travelling, but travel always takes a huge bite out of one's bank account. To combat instantaneous account drain before and after a trip, I set up an automatic transfer to send $100 to my travel savings account each time I get paid. Now I'm setting aside $2,600 over a year and I can avoid zeroing my chequeing account around travel time.

Similarly, I automatically set aside $40 every paycheque into a gifts account. I can dip into it during the year for one-off events like birthdays and weddings, and when Christmas rolls around I've got a buffer of a few hundred dollars set aside for holiday expenses.

Finally, I automatically set aside $20 every paycheque to give to charity. Like my other savings accounts, this account slowly buffers until I hear about an interesting cause. For instance, my buddy Kyle emailed me to ask if I'd support him in fundraising marathon, and I was able to donate fifty bucks without having to cut my weekly budget or dip into another pocket of savings.

I also contribute to an RRSP as well as set some cash into a TFSA each paycheque (saving for a house).

In total, over one-third of my take-home pay is automatically transferred out of my chequing account as soon as I get paid. Then I pay rent, car insurance, and phone bills, and what's left pays for my groceries and other weekly expenses. I really, really like this kind of budgeting - save what you need right away, pay your bills, and live on what's left. To make this type of saving easier, I aggressively paid down my (minimal) student debt as quickly as I could after finishing school.

Once Robyn and I buy a house we'll probably want to keep up a "household" fund - for all of those future broken dishwashers, re-shinglings, and deck repairs.

Any good finance or online banking tips to share?

"Brahm's Yellow Dots" Blog Linked & Quoted in PC World!

A few years ago I learned about the secret matrix of yellow dots that colour laser printers embed on every single page you print on colour laser printers - even B&W-only pages. The key word here is laser - traditional colour inkjet printers don't do this (at least that we know of).

Don't believe me? Print anything from a colour laser printer. Scan it at the highest resolution you can. Now look closely. Here's what I found on my printer and here's some further analysis.

Anyway. I blogged, and I blogged, I wrote letters and made phone calls to Lexmark Canada until they finally admitted to making their printers include the secret yellow dot pattern. This pattern is unique to every printer and can be used to identify from what printer a document is printed - which is, in my opinion, a privacy issue. My motivation was exploring the issue from the consumer side and seeing how a company would respond to a consumer challenge of the technology.

Eventually I got a letter from the president of Lexmark Canada, offering me a refund for my printer. I didn't want the refund (I still liked the printer, despite the privacy issue), but in my mind the story was done. Mission accomplished - consumers who were willing to be vocal enough could at least achieve a refund. The blog didn't get any attention during my adventures, so I left it online for others to find... eventually.

Fast-forward to earlier this week. I get an email from a senior editor at PC World asking if they can link to the blog for an article they're writing on the yellow dots issue! I sent a reply back saying "absolutely" and some reasons why I left the blog online.

PC World published their article yesterday and even quoted my email! Here's an excerpt:

Consumers who discover the dots are understandably surprised. Brahm's Yellow Dots, a blog dating from 2008, chronicles the efforts of Brahm Neufeld, a student at the University of Saskatchewan in Canada, to communicate with his printer's vendor, Lexmark, after a friend told him about the yellow dots. To Lexmark's credit, the company eventually acknowledged what was going on and even offered to refund Neufeld for his printer. Neufeld, now an electrical engineer, remains concerned about the technology and the extreme discretion that printer vendors are exercising around it. "My motivation was always to document my experience--as a consumer--trying to get printer companies to fess up to this somewhat-shady practice."

How cool is that! I am curious to see if this makes it to the print version of the magazine.

I took a peek at my blog's analytics and I've netted about 1,000 new hits from the article. Not bad!

(for the Yellow Dots blog, not this one)

Cheers to PC World who is keeping some momentum on this issue going!

Thanks TicketMaster!

No sarcasm in the blog title, I swear! TicketMaster and I have a rocky relationship, but their customer service department just totally redeemed themselves.

A week ago, I bought a ticket to see the Montreal Impact play the Carolina Railhawks (this is soccer) on May 14th. A few days later, my dad said he'd be able to swing by Montreal on the way to Florida, where he has some work to do.

His visit overlapped the game, so I said I'd try and get a second ticket. I called TicketMaster sales and asked the girl I spoke to if there was a spare seat beside mine. She said there wasn't. I asked if I could return the ticket I had in exchange for two adjacent seats. She said she didn't know (she was Sales only) and transferred me to customer service.

I talked to this totally friendly guy named Quentin (I think). I quickly told him the story and his immediate reaction was "sure, that should be possible!" My expectations were far too low! To make a long story short, my total time on the phone for exchanging my lonely seat for two seats beside each other was 17 minutes, and there were no surprise service fees or anything like that for the exchange. At the end of the call I thanked Quentin and told him I was very impressed with the great service.

Good job TicketMaster! Keep it up!

GREAT Customer Service from Air Canada!

Believe it or not! Read on to find out...

On my first visit back to Saskatoon from Montreal, Air Canada let a connecting flight in Toronto leave without me. Some details here. Every flight from Toronto to Saskatoon was full and it was looking like I would be spending the night, so when I heard a boarding call to Regina I ran to the gate and got on that plane with seconds to spare. Robyn picked me up from Regina - how nice!

The catch: because I didn't talk to Customer Service in the Toronto airport, I was told I wouldn't receive any compensation for the inconvenience (that gate agent who got me to Regina was great, though - she was just telling it like she saw it).

I wrote Air Canada's Customer Relations department a letter where I explained the timing of the whole situation, provided my confirmation numbers, and requested compensation. The last two paragraphs looked like this:

To summarize, my desire to get home and spend time with family and friends caused me to miss being compensated by Customer Service for the missed connection, and caused my (patient, loving) girlfriend to incur a 500km round-trip to pick me up in her vehicle. I am requesting a $200 travel voucher from Air Canada to fix this inconvenience.  

Considering I avoided a night in a hotel at Air Canada’s expense, and considering the costs of gas and mileage on my girlfriend’s vehicle, I believe this figure is fair. If that’s not enough, this show of good faith from Customer Relations would guarantee Air Canada gets my business over WestJet for the next year’s worth of Montreal-to-Saskatoon round trips (13 in all, or about $8,450 with today’s prices), and guarantee a positive recommendation to friends, family, and colleagues. 

Without prejudice,
Brahm Neufeld

Well lo and behold! I got an email today that read:

Dear Mr. Neufeld,
Thank you for taking the time to contact our office. 

I sincerely regret to learn of the difficulties you experienced while travelling to Saskatoon on February 25, 2011 and on behalf of Air Canada, offer our most sincere apologies. 

As a gesture of goodwill and in recognition of your valued support, I have taken the liberty of issuing a future travel credit in the amount of $200.00 CAD.  

.... {details of the travel credit} 

We look forward to serving you again under less extenuating circumstances. It will be our privilege to welcome you on board. 

Sincerely,
{redacted}
Customer Relations

So there you have it - an excellent resolution!

Truthfully, I didn't know whether my letter would have any effect - I've never asked for anything like this. But Air Canada came through, surprised me with a very clear apology and exactly the compensation I asked for.

And I'll hold up my end of the bargain - I'll be flying Air Canada the rest of the year, wherever possible. Errr... except the two trips I already have booked on WestJet.

Check-In: Predictions About SaskTel's 3G+ Network Upgrade

Back in July, I wrote this post about SaskTel's HSPA network upgrade. Phase 1 was rolled out on August 16th.

At the end of my post, I summarized my predictions:

So, hedge your bets. SaskTel has ~30 days until August 16, 2010, when they’re going to light up the new network. Sorry SaskTel! Here are my pessimistic predictions:

1. Some kind of launch day complication or delay that affects CDMA users.
2. Sub-standard device lineup on launch day.
3. No iPhone 4.
4. No Android devices (I would be truly sad about this one).
5. Palm Centro still available to purchase on SaskTel website.

 Let's see how accurate I was. One point per correct answer!

1. Some kind of launch day complication or delay that affects CDMA users. 

To my knowledge, the network light-up went off without a hitch, and nobody I know noticed any adverse effects on their existing phones. Good job, SaskTel!

0/1 Points.

2. Sub-standard device lineup on launch day. 

The 3G+ network launched with five devices: Nokia 6530, Nokia 7230, a Novatel Internet Stick, BlackBerry Pearl 9100, and the BlackBerry Bold 9700. A few days later, they added the Samsung Gravity Touch, but it wasn't available on launch day so it doesn't count.

The two BlackBerry devices are pretty rad, but the Nokias are a big "meh" and even the Gravity Touch isn't that impressive.

0.5/1 Points

3. No iPhone 4. 

Right on the money!

1/1 Points

4. No Android Devices

The Samsung Galaxy S Vibrant looks like it's on its way - which is good, it's a well-reviewed phone - but it wasn't available at launch.

1/1 Points

5. Palm Centro still available to purchase on SaskTel website. 

Awwww.... poor little Palm Centro. Still available.

1/1 Points

3.5/5 isn't bad! Truth be told, I wish I'd been wrong about more. Oh well. Here's hoping that this is just the start of a turnaround for device availability at SaskTel!

Water for Thought

Our homepage at work is an intranet news page with company updates, global news, and a Quality Point. Yesterday's point really surprised me:

"Quality Point: Americans drink $11 billion worth of bottled water, i.e. more [bottled] water than milk. Furthermore, Americans drink nearly as much bottled water as beer. If the growth trend continues, Americans could be drinking more bottled water than tap water (which in most of America is perfectly good water) within a few years." [emphasis added]

Not only is bottled water more expensive than gasoline (per litre), it's also unregulated in the USA and Canada, there are no standards for its production, and it's basically just tap water anyway. Crazy.

Scams

Lately, I've seen local news stories of people falling for scams and losing money, property, or both. This non-local story was on the radio this morning.

Some of these circumstances seemed like they’d be a very obvious scam. It’s got me thinking about how we trust organizations we do business with, how we determine credibility, and how we fall for scams.

Having a computer science dad, I had home internet access before lots of kids at school. Actually, before we had internet at home, I remember going to my dad’s office at the university and being allowed to search for pictures of the Simpsons and Toy Story on Netscape Navigator, then printing them on a colour laser (the unit probably cost an insane amount of money at the time).

When we got home internet access (around... ‘96 or ‘97?) my dad told me two simple rules for protecting myself online:

• Never, ever post my name, address, or other personal information online. 
• Never, ever trust anything online (banner ads, spam, e-commerce) - it’s ALL a scam. 

These were probably the two best pieces of advice anyone could have been given growing up with the internet in the 90s and the early 2000s.

The evolution of the internet from 1997 to 2010 has made following these rules impossible. The social web encourages disclosure of personal information, and our most trusted organizations and companies have websites that we happily plug our information into (universities, science camps, e-commerce, banks, etc). This isn’t a bad thing - I love the convenience of web-based services.

Despite the changes to the online landscape, my dad’s two rules of the internet never lost their significance, especially when new services pop up online. It’s safest for consumers not to trust organizations by default. It took me a long time to become convinced that sites like eBay, PayPal, Facebook, Google’s non-search services, Quicken Online, Twitter, and more were trustworthy enough to use. I don’t use online products without careful consideration and review (or a bogus test account).

A happy side effect of my dad’s two rules for the internet is how easily those principles transfer to “offline” business:

• Never give your info to any company/organization, ever. 
• Never trust any company/organization - everything is a scam. 

The point is exaggerated. I trust and do business with dozens of companies. Organizations that I am unfamiliar with have to earn my trust, be it through a positive first experience or through reputation and reviews.

Let me rephrase: There’s no social or economic obligation to trust a business by default, and consumers should never feel guilty when they (directly or indirectly) question the legitimacy of an organization. Organizations are completely responsible for earning and keeping the consumer’s trust.

Over the past few years, something unexpected has happened: I trust organizations more through the web than in real life.

For example:

• When RBC sends me communications through my online banking inbox, I trust those messages much more than the RBC telemarketers who phone me with the same offer. How do I know those calls are from RBC?
• When someone shows up at my door from the Heart & Stroke Foundation, the Lung Association, or another fundraising campaign, I politely turn them away and say that I’ll contribute to the cause through their website, if anything. No website, no credibility. Sorry, random dude raising money for your kids' hockey team*. 
• When someone phones me with a survey about a service they provide for me (say, SaskTel or Shaw), how do I know I’m actually talking to a rep from that company? Send me a link to the survey, hosted directly on your organization’s website.

*I could have sworn someone pulled this scam in Saskatoon a while ago, but I couldn't find a link.

Being a skeptical consumer is most important when money or personal information is involved. If my car dealer phones me about a recall, or London Drugs phones to say my photos are ready, or UPS shows up to deliver a package, should I worry? No. There are few practical reasons not to trust a purely informational solicitation, especially from an organization you’re connected to.

So, why do we fall for scams? Is it generational, or is it a result of our previous experiences? I don’t really know. Perhaps people are too trusting, or perhaps the enticement of money, love or reward eclipses that little internal voice that repeats, “if it seems too good to be true, it probably is.” I found some interesting research  from the Office of Fair Trading in the UK on who is susceptible to scams, but no one has a straight answer.

To wrap up, like the best way to protect yourself from getting scammed or ripped off is to assume that everything is a scam or a ripoff, online or offline (a word of caution: be practical, not cynical), avoid acting on impulse, and make sure that organizations earn your trust.

Will Smartphones Availability Edge Out Small Carriers?

Here's a thought: Will the rise in popularity of smartphones push smaller carriers out of the market?

This past week I posted about SaskTel's upcoming network upgrade in August. Wayne added a helpful comment; he'd tracked down the preliminary smartphone lineup, which includes two new BlackBerry devices and two unexciting Nokia phones.

Tech-savvy consumers want the latest and greatest in smartphones. The larger the carrier, the sooner you can get the latest and greatest devices. If you're with a small carrier, you get to play the waiting game. Or the jealousy game. Or both.

SaskTel has admitted they're working on getting the iPhone 4, but I'm skeptical that will happen. Rogers has the Sony Xperia X10 and will have the iPhone 4 (as will sister company Fido), Bell will have the iPhone 4 (though Bell doesn't do business in little ole' Saskatchewan), and Telus has the HTC Hero and the HTC Desire is coming soon.

As ill-reviewed as Rogers is here in Saskatchewan, they're the only national carrier with a full selection of BlackBerry, Android, and iPhone devices.

And why is Rogers ill-reviewed in Saskatchewan? Well, their coverage is one issue - SaskTel certainly has them beat. But once SaskTel's new network is operational, Rogers customers should be able to roam on that expanded network (correct me if I'm wrong)

Rogers also adjusts their prices and plans to compete regionally. Go to Rogers.com and select that you live on Ontario. Look at voice/data plans, and you can see that evening calling starts at 9PM. Terrible! But chance your locale to Saskatchewan and look at those plans, evening calling starts at 6PM, presumably to compete with SaskTel's provincial stronghold on the mobile market.

Guess what? Their rates aren't even that bad. I priced out a new Sony Xperia X10 and they've included a helpful bill calculator on checkout, it would be approximately what I'm paying for my BlackBerry on SaskTel.

Eight years ago, when all phones did the same thing, plus or minus a few bells and whistles, SaskTel was the obvious choice for cell phone service in Saskatchewan for their coverage. Now that line is blurred - other providers have equally great coverage and offer better devices for similar rates.

I'm not about to jump SaskTel's ship and go to Rogers (I have 2 years left on my current contract, and I can't bring myself to give up BlackBerry Messenger for an Android phone quite yet), but since no carrier has a significant coverage or price advantage, more and more decisions will be made based on device availability. Carriers will need to stay up-to-date with the latest and greatest devices to earn new business.