Invisible Privacy | Online Privacy

TRANSPORTATION STUDIES: Yet another reason to register your vehicles with a LLC.

Someone I know well just received in the mail a POSTCARD (very public!) from the Lake Tahoe Transportation Study addressed to their full legal name and the street address (and PO Box) they used to register one particular vehicle. Yes, I am looking at the postcard as I type this... It reads,

"Dear Traveler,
The Tahoe Metropolitan Planning Organization (TMPO) is studying the travel behavior of residents and visitors to the Lake Tahoe region. The results will help us predict future travel patterns and prioritize transportation improvements in the area. Resource Systems Group, Inc. and Parsons Brinkerhoff are conducting this study on behalf of the TMPO.
You have been invited to participate because a vehicle registered to your address traveled in or through the Lake Tahoe region on Friday, August 19.2011. We would like to ask you a brief series of questions about your trip on that day. Please go to the website below and enter your password. Upon completing the short, 5 minute survey, you will be entered into a drawing for one $1,000 grand prize and forty $100 second prizes."

They then list the website and the password, and have a statement about if you would prefer to participate via telephone and give a telephone number.

This is not VOLUNTARY PARTICIPATION. They collected data on my friend as they were driving through the area without their permission or consent and then entered my friend's personal data into 2 corporate databases.

I have of course advised my friend to put all vehicles into an LLC, but it is too late for that one occurrence. I wonder how many "transportation studies" are being done throughout the USA this year, and how they will use the data?

I have also advised my friend to contact an attorney or perhaps the ACLU to sue for loss of privacy in the hopes of stopping this type of nasty behavior.

Does anyone have any input or advise on how to proceed with something like this?

And please pass the word - if you are traveling through California, in particular the Lake Tahoe region... you will be survielled and will be getting a very public postcard with your full name (first, middle and last> that go with vehicle registration along with whatever street address and PO Box you use.
 

My mom just got one in the mail and she gave them hell as she felt her privacy violated. she told them what if her or her husband did not want the other to know they were up staying in a time share in Tahoe this could ruin somebody's marriage etc.