@conscious.app: On today's real life Black Mirror episode, Target is now tracking you through their shopping baskets. A Target employee filmed a small black device clipped to a store hand basket and posted the ID number printed on it. That number is registered to Acuity Brands, the company that makes Target's ceiling lights. The device is a Bluetooth tracker that Acuity sells to retailers. Acuity's own announcement says the tags attach to shopping carts to track their movement, so store staff can understand customer shopping behavior and monitor employee activity. The tracker talks to the ceiling, because Target put Acuity lights with Bluetooth chips inside them into nearly half its 1,800 stores. Acuity says the system works without the shopper downloading an app or agreeing to anything. These tags broadcast to the ceiling, so nothing is pulled off your phone, and Target has not publicly commented on the baskets. The part worth worrying about is what Target has already written down about itself. Target's privacy policy counts your location inside the store as information it collects, and says it may link that with your app activity, your website activity, the ads you get shown, and your email. That same policy lists cameras that read license plates at its stores, voiceprints kept as biometric data, data brokers it collects personal information from, and training AI models as one use of what it collects. Target's app has already changed prices based on where you are standing. Minneapolis station KARE 11 found ten items cost $262 more inside the store than in the parking lot. Target changed the app after that story ran. Fight corporate surveillance. Use the Conscious Spend app to find ethical companies that don't watch you while you shop.

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Saturday 05 September 2026 18:47:50 GMT