The Conway, Ark., company Acxiom Corporation that not many have heard of has more than 23,000 computer servers that are collecting, collating and analyzing consumer data.
Acxiom is at the forefront of the multi-billion dollar industry of database marketing. According to the article in The New York Times, its servers process more than 50 trillion data “transactions” a year. Company executives have said its database contains information about 500 million active consumers worldwide, with about 1,500 data points per person. That includes a majority of adults in the United States. Such large-scale data mining and analytics — based on information available in public records, consumer surveys and the like — are perfectly legal.