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“Almost every company”
You mean like 5-10 major companies?
There are thousands of smaller companies buying ad space and access to consumer data.
And “buying data” isn’t what it sounds like for the most part. Few companies are out there buying and selling raw data tied to individuals. For the most part it is a company buying heavily targeted ads from someone like Google that has ALL of your data. They know, with surgical precision, how to target ads at you. Company B just tells Google “ we want to target a 35 year old, white, dad of three that is lacking in his masculinity and wants to feel rugged, while not making him feel emasculated”.
The you get a Dr Squatch ad.
Facebook was the same. A company would hand them a token for a visitor that went to their site like say Amazon. They then tell Facebook if you see that visitor token show them an ad for this vacuum cleaner. No information ever traded hands except some anonymous id and money.
But I have had places actually sell my information. Comcast Various Banks The State of California
I had a weird last name attached to Comcast never used it anywhere elae. Started getting mail from various companies for Rev WeirdLastname
I registered an LLC, all these compliance companies now send me mail. Thanks California
Tech companies not so much they just target ads and I can block those
This varies state to state, but it’s likely that your LLC registration (including its members names) is public record. In that case, the state didn’t sell your info. Anyone can view that info and use it to contact you.
This sort of thing was rather startling to me when my wife and I bought our house. Apparently property sales are all public record where we live, so we started getting mail from random insurance companies within a month after moving.