> What I don't think is practical is identifying everyone who may or may not have left a particular bar.
This is weaker than your original claim which was that deducing passenger identities is "practically impossible". You've now conceded that the barista scenario is plausible and left open several others I mentioned.
But let's examine this one, just bars. The basis of your criticism is that some bars are located in residential buildings. First off this still leaves quite a number of bars that aren't. But even for those that are, the time of day and direction of travel is a pretty fair indicator of people who are bar patrons vs. residents. I.e. trips departing the building after 1am and arriving at a residential location are probably a lot more likely to be bar patrons than residents.
And don't forget that this public data set is also potentially privacy-violating when combined with other data about the destination, such as information that other residents of that location may know. So even if the general public couldn't determine much from a trip from a gay bar to a home residence one night, a live-in parent could.
This is weaker than your original claim which was that deducing passenger identities is "practically impossible". You've now conceded that the barista scenario is plausible and left open several others I mentioned.
But let's examine this one, just bars. The basis of your criticism is that some bars are located in residential buildings. First off this still leaves quite a number of bars that aren't. But even for those that are, the time of day and direction of travel is a pretty fair indicator of people who are bar patrons vs. residents. I.e. trips departing the building after 1am and arriving at a residential location are probably a lot more likely to be bar patrons than residents.
And don't forget that this public data set is also potentially privacy-violating when combined with other data about the destination, such as information that other residents of that location may know. So even if the general public couldn't determine much from a trip from a gay bar to a home residence one night, a live-in parent could.