Do people frown upon companies exposing data? Of course they do. With identify theft being such a crucial issue and enough scandals already involving companies making information willingly available, just about everyone wants a company to protect private data.
In fact, a recent study has shown that just about everyone thinks that any company with sensitive data about their customers should do absolutely everything to protect it. On top of that, almost everyone else said that protecting data should be a companies highest priority along with data losses being completely unacceptable:
Ninety-five percent of respondents said there is no excuse for exposing customers' confidential information, and 93% said that businesses are obligated to protect sensitive content.
Of course, there's more to protecting data than just wanting it to happen. There is a lot of cost and effort involved, particularly when you have large amounts of data and a lot of people with access to it. It only takes one leak anywhere in a company to expose confidential information.
There is a trust issue in all of this, and a company that has a TJ Maxx style scenario is going to have a very tough PR battle to win. Nothing is more powerful in advertising than word of mouth.