Just a few months ago, the smart-card(e-dollar) issuer in Hong Kong was proved selling customer data to several companies. It's extremely irony that the largest share holder of the smart-card issuer company is the government.
If Mr. Scott search the relevant news in web, he will be inspired to draw many other comic about this topic.
(My poor English is difficult to understand. Sorry for all readers.)
Scott read my mind, I blogged about this on the same day, All your data are belong to us: http://wp.me/pB9Ws-6h. Now I'll have to point everyone to this strip.
If the law would classify your personal information as intellectual property , then when you give Customer Information that could be classified as giving permission on a per business basis. If they knowingly sold your data to other companies, that would be an infringement