Similarly, some of us regard our name and address as more or less public information, as these facts can be found in a phone book, but others regard this information as very private. The Privacy Act 1998 describes personal information as 'information about a person whose identity is apparent or can readily be ascertained from the information'. Individuals may choose to reveal their personal information to varying degrees. A disreputable person or company with your personal information could order goods and services in your name. While this is very rare, even the possibility of it occurring reinforces the need to carefully guard your personal information.
Unwanted advertising can also prove quite annoying.
If your personal information is obtained by third parties or marketeers, they can then begin to build a consumer profile depicting your individual spending habits, and shopping preferences. This profiling data can then be used by a range of companies to selectively advertise their goods, via unsolicited emails. Once this information is shared, it is virtually impossible to stop it being used. At the moment, online privacy policies produced by private businesses are for the most part, up to individual companies. The Government has announced that it is developing legislation to support and strengthen the privacy protection measures that many businesses have already developed.