Wired News’ Threat Level reports on a disturbing change in American Express’s policies.

American Express wants to keep in touch.

So much so that Amex is changing its fine print so that it or its robots can call or SMS card holders on any phone line a member ever uses to contact the company, and the card holder will get the bill.

That change in its U.S. card holders’ terms of service agreement means travelers should be very wary about using hotel phones, pay phones, borrowed mobiles, or satellite phones to call Amex — even in an emergency, according to travel guru Edward Hasbrouck who first brought attention to the change.

The changes were announced in credit card statements mailed out in February and they go into effect in April 2, unless card holders call to cancel.

This entry was posted on Friday, March 6th, 2009 and is filed under Anonymity, Identification, Technology. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Possibly related posts:

• Ars Technica: Congress, wary of Amazon’s Silk browser, demands answers on privacy
• Update on News of the World Phone-Hacking Scandal in UK
• NY Daily News: NYPD tracking cell phone owners, but foes aren’t sure practice is legal