Short Synopsis
Most Americans move through stores unaware of the beacons, lighting, sound signals, bar codes, and purchase histories that retailers use to track them and to decide how to treat them. In this timely and eye-opening call to attention, media expert Joseph Turow details this unfolding shopping revolution and assesses its repercussions.

Full Synopsis
By one expert's prediction, within twenty years half of Americans will have body implants that tell retailers how they feel about specific products as they browse their local stores. The notion may be outlandish, but it reflects executives' drive to understand shoppers in the aisles with the same obsessive detail that they track us online. In fact, a hidden surveillance revolution is already taking place inside brick-and-mortar stores, where Americans still do most of their buying. Drawing on his interviews with retail executives, analysis of trade publications, and experiences at insider industry meetings, advertising and digital studies expert Joseph Turow pulls back the curtain on these trends, showing how a new hyper-competitive generation of merchants—including Macy's, Target, and Walmart—is already using data mining, in-store tracking, and predictive analytics to change the way we buy, undermine our privacy, and define our reputations.

"[Joseph Turow's] book offers invaluable insights about in-store data-gathering, including frank observations from unnamed industry sources. . . . Valuable reading for shoppers and retailers alike." ---Kirkus

"Turow masterfully uncovers and explains the staggering efforts of retailers to stratify consumers socially and economically." ---Joel R. Reidenberg, coauthor of Data Privacy Law

"This fact-filled book performs a genuine public service and should put every shopper on high alert." ---Shoshana Zuboff, Harvard Business School

“A revelatory look at the new forms of surveillance in the seemingly mundane world of brick-and-mortar stores.” ---Ira Rubinstein, New York University School of Law