What information do wireless adapters send back to retailer/manufacturer?

[nine9s]

What information, about your computer and you, do wireless adapters send to retailer/others?

I bought a Cisco Linksys - AE1000 High-Performance Wireless-N Adapter at Best Buy recently. Today I received a thank you email, from Best Buy, on this purchase. The message was sent to my main email address (which I do not use as my everday email but is my account-name in my modem for my DSL Service) but the salutation name was the main user name of my wireless computer. I bought this product with a gift card, so Best Buy did not obtain any of this information at the point of sale. So evidently the product sent the email address that was in my modem and also sent the wireless computer name.

What other information could it have sent?

Also, does anyone know if it is illegal for a consumer product to send detailed information about your computer to a business?

 

[mvbighead]

Reward Zone member?

 

[nine9s]

Reward Zone member?

Yes but I DID NOT present my reward zone at point of sale nor my phone number because I was in a hurry.

Also, the email address, to which the thank you message was sent, is not the email address I use for Reward Zones and the salutation name is not linked to my Reward Zone either.

The only other vairable is that the wireless computer was originally purchased at Best Buy but again no information was given at the point of sale of the wireless adapter. So no matter the source, it seems that adapter communicated with some outside company (either directly to Best Buy or Cisco, the maker of the product, and Cisco then shared the information with Best Buy.) My the product automatically registeres itself and takes information from your system to do it. Maybe it is some registration process and I missed it in the set-up but even if that is the source, it seems very creepy to me that it sent information from within my modem (only source for that email address if it found it on its own.)

 

[mvbighead]

I suppose it's possible that your email address was stored somewhere in the computer, and the information there was sent when you installed a driver package... but I've never heard of that sort of thing before.

 

[JackMDS]

What the term wireless adapters has to do with this it is just a dumb 33mW Radio.

Wireless adapter on its own is no different than wire adapter, or any other hardware that helps to connect to the Network/Internet.

What do you envision is in Wireless adapters that can do any thing else concerning your ""concern"". 😕


😎

 

[nine9s]

What the term wireless adapters has to do with this it is just a dumb 33mW Radio.

Wireless adapter on its own is no different than wire adapter, or any other hardware that helps to connect to the Network/Internet.

What do you envision is in Wireless adapters that can do any thing else concerning your ""concern"". 😕


😎

I asume either it had a registration program within the hardware or the installation program, on CD, had a registration program that retrieved and then sent the information.

Again, I gave no such information at the point of sale and used a payment method that did not have such information, yet somehow Best Buy knew (1) my main email account which is my DSL account name and (2) the user-name of my wireless computer and (3) that I bought the adapter.

How else did Best Buy obtain that information unless some program related to the wireless adpater (whether in the adapter or in the installation program) delivered it?

 

[VirtualLarry]

wow, that sounds really suspicious.

Considering Linksys routers now send every web site you visit to Cisco, it doesn't surprise me that they might pull something like this too.