Posted on April 12, 2009 - by Venik

Is Sprint Reading Your E-mail?

We all know that Google has a huge database of your online searching and browsing interests. We also know that every credit card company is tracking your spending habits more diligently than you do. We even know that your Windows operating system comes pre-configured with a clandestine application called the WGA Notification tool, designed to gather information about users and applications on your PC and to quietly transmit this information to Microsoft.

In most cases this spying activity is being kept under wraps. Not that it’s a big secret, but neither Google nor the credit card companies are exactly advertising their information gathering efforts. Not the case with Sprint. In an interesting departure from industry-standard practices, Sprint’s latest commercial is centered around various statistical information about your cell phone habits. Here’s a quick transcript:

“Welcome to the Now network. Population: forty nine million. Right now twenty three million cell phone calls are being made. Three hundred and eighty thousand people just hung up. One million emails are en-route: seven percent of them contain the words “miracle banana diet”. They are hitting sixty three thousand spam filters, now. Twice as many people are searching the word “dog” versus “cat”. Himie, the talking boxer, is being uploaded to YouTube from someone’s phone, now. Two million people are sending a text message during a business meeting. Most popular subject: diapers. Two hundred thirty three thousand people just twittered on Twitter. Twenty six percent of you viewing this have no idea what that means. Six thousand people are researching restaurant in a cab. Twenty nine of them just left their phone in that same cab. Thirty thousand people just landed and are switching on their phones. This is what’s happening now. America’s most dependable 3G network. Bringing you the first wireless 4G network. Sprint – the Now network.”

I am not sure about the talking boxer, but a quick search on Google confirms some of this statistics. For example, it is true that twice as many people search for the word “dog” versus the word “cat”. The Miracle Morning Banana Diet is a real diet plan (whether it works or not – I am the wrong person to ask). There are two options: either Sprint’s new commercial is full of bogus statistics, or Sprint is reading your emails and text messages. Either way, this commercial is unlikely to compel me to switch to Sprint. It would seem that America’s “most dependable” 3G network is also the most inquisitive.

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