Big Brother

This post does not relate to the fact that my little brother out grew me years ago, but of extreme confusion and a bit of fear at exactly how much this world we live in knows about us. My friend had his phone stolen yesterday. He walked out of a restaurant, realized the phone was on the table, walked back in to all the same people except a new couple occupying the table he had been at but no phone and no one has seen it. Manager's office - no phone. Lame. Soon he realized the fully charged phone was off, thus confirming in his mind someone that he probably sat within 10 feet of eating his dinner slid a cracked screen G1 into their pocket and turned it off. (Thus disabling the GPS, yes he's been down that road). So beyond the lack of morality of these restaurant diners on a rainy Texas Wednesday, it is really his call to the phone company that is troubling. As he goes through the arduous process of explaining to ten computers and a dozen reps in several countries his story he gets to the all too bouncy and happy woman who has a series of questions to determine identity. Questions that could come from any number of places (thus not info he has given to the phone company. First, this was a business phone, so all purchasing, billing etc went to his boss. Still there was info on my friend. Which of these five addresses have you been associated with in the last four years... How old is Roy Carpenter. A name I'm willing to post here, because the phone company already knows it. Roy is an uncle to my friend. An uncle that except for a random visit when Joe (friend who lost phone) had a delivery in the building next door to Roy's home six months ago he would not have seen in over 4 years. Why does the phone company know some one's fairly distant uncle? And why do they assume we know the age of our fairly distant uncle's? What happened to your high school mascot? Mother's maiden name? favorite pet? street you grew up on? What happened to information that I give when opening an account? Who is your source T-Mobile?? You scare me!!