How did telemarketers get my number? I uncover the labyrinthine world of Australia’s data brokers | Priya Dev for the Conversation
In today’s digital age, where personal data is a new kind of gold, these companies share our information as easily as TikTok videos
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Last year, I started getting a lot of unsolicited phone calls, mainly from people trying to sell me things. This came as a surprise because, as a data scientist, I am very careful about what personal information I let out into the world. So I set out to discover what had happened.
My investigation took several months. It eventually led me to the labyrinthine world of data brokers.
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CoreLogic gets data from a variety of sources … most of the information we collect comes from public records, which we license from government departments and agencies. We may also collect personal information from third parties such as through real estate agents, tenancy and strata mangers, financial institutions and marketing database providers.
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