Googling passengers: British Airways wants to know you !

[Anil]

In the last week, media in the UK and a few in the blogosphere has been buzzing about British Airways googling passengers before they arrive. Will Oremus in a  Slate article wrote:

We all know by now that websites track our online activities in order to personalize ads and content. It shouldn’t be too much of a surprise that offline businesses have started doing the same.

Yet British Airways’ announcement that it plans to start doing Google image searches of some customers so its staff can greet them by name isn’t sitting well with privacy advocates. “Since when has buying a flight ticket meant giving your airline permission to start hunting for information about you on the Internet?”, the delightfully named Nick Pickles of UK-based privacy group Big Brother Watch griped to the London Evening Standard.

There is more here and here.  The Register, an IT online magazine had this to say - 

British Airways has denied "compiling secretive data" about its business-class passengers after launching its "Know Me" programme to personalise customers' travel plans.

The Evening Standard today reported that BA staff will be given Apple iPads and told to use Google to research key frequent flyers. The employees are encouraged to download individuals' pictures, provided by a Google Images app, to help them identify the VIPs as they arrive.

The whole debate is about privacy and excessive intrusion. Or is it ??? Is it about it's high value customers, and or its Elite customers ? Or is British Airways being ingenuous ?