Earlier today I decided to purchase some additional memory for a somewhat sluggish laptop, so I gave the kind folks at Dell a call. After a few minutes of back-and-forth we agreed on the modules I needed to buy, got the credit card stuff out of the way, and then something really interesting and disturbing happened. The operator said, "before we can complete the transaction, under the Patriot Act I am required to ask you some questions."
Yikes, I thought. I didn't know that memory was so ...dangerous. Sure, I said -- what are the questions?
It turns out, according to the Dell operator the US government wants to know who will be using the computer whose memory was upgrading. They also wanted to know what I was planning to use the computer for, and the cities where the computer would be used.
I managed to get the operator laughing along with me, discussing how this reminded me of those famous questions that were formerly asked of airline travelers. (Did you pack your luggage yourself?) I remarked that it clearly hadn't ocurred to the government that a criminal (or terrorist) might ...lie.
I'd like to understand where this data is aggregated. This might be industry-wide -- it turns out that an Apple reseller was doing the same thing this September, as noted by technology author Maria Langer.
After reviewing the EFF.org site I hadn't found anything about this new exercise in "security."
I don't know if this information is simply retained by the online retailer, or if it is sent to yet another disk farm in the sky for data mining by alert analysts looking for unusual memory purchases.
Somehow, this seems like the sort of burdensome, intrusive government interference in business that a true conservative (or perhaps the citizen of a free country) would want stopped. Anybody know where the regs live that mandate this behavior from computer sellers?
Updated: This has been going on for quite a while, as highlighted here in 2005. There have been many other reports as well. Googling Dell and "Patriot Act" reveals lots of similar reported cases, and that other online retailers are not asking similar questions. My favorite story related to a Dell laser printer (the laser could be adapted to a shark, I suppose.)