Apple Patents Data-Poisoning

It’s not a new idea, but Apple Computer has received a patent on “Techniques to pollute electronic profiling”:

Abstract: Techniques to pollute electronic profiling are provided. A cloned identity is created for a principal. Areas of interest are assigned to the cloned identity, where a number of the areas of interest are divergent from true interests of the principal. One or more actions are automatically processed in response to the assigned areas of interest. The actions appear to network eavesdroppers to be associated with the principal and not with the cloned identity.

Claim 1:

A device-implemented method, comprising: cloning, by a device, an identity for a principal to form a cloned identity; configuring, by the device, areas of interest to be associated with the cloned identity, the areas of interest are divergent from true areas of interest for a true identity for the principal; and automatically processing actions associated with the areas of interest for the cloned identity over a network to pollute information gathered by eavesdroppers performing dataveillance on the principal and refraining from processing the actions when the principal is detected as being logged onto the network and also refraining from processing the actions when the principal is unlikely to be logged onto the network.

EDITED TO ADD (7/12): Similar technology and concept has already been developed by Breadcrumbs Solutions, and will be out as a free beta software in a few months.

Posted on June 21, 2012 at 5:51 AM • 24 Comments