8484 internet privacy

Internet privacy has always been a bit of a myth. Syadmins read user mail in the old days. Check newsgroup lists. The huge explosion in the user base made it harder for stuff like that.

But the rule I was taught in 1984. Do nothing you don't want remembered for ever. That was before Google went and dug up all those old usenet tapes.

Does this mean I should cancel my subscription to Womans Weekly?

[ame=http://youtube.com/watch?v=0hpiAcW99yc&feature=related]YouTube - Lets Do It[/ame]

[quote=Torchiarolan;79511].......Never mind the "Bondage Monthly" subscriptions its the "Perverts Periodical" that worries me[/quote]

Why - is it that much more expensive?

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In my world of work there is much discussion about employers looking up prospective employees on Facebook and other sites, and making recruitment decisions based on what they find.

I do wonder whether younger people today really understand the importance of their own privacy, having grown up in a cyber-world where you routinely spill all sorts of personal information

[quote=annec;79542]In my world of work there is much discussion about employers looking up prospective employees on Facebook and other sites, and making recruitment decisions based on what they find.[/quote]

Yes it gets mentioned often. To be honest i wouldn't want to work for an employer like that. I got headhunted a few years ago by two very large American consultancy businesses that chose to pry into their employees private lives, and indeed to lay claim to the intellectual property of their employees. One went so far as to say that if I wrote a book or wrote music in my free time then they would own it because they did not recognise the concept of free time. They paid the salaries so they assumed they owned employees body and soul.

They also made it clear that they considered that employees were always company representatives and that anyone speaking out of turn or in a manner not approved of by the directors would be dismissed.

So I told them to get lost. No doubt, they don't consider the absence of someone with a bad attitude a loss and I don't consider it a loss to work for myself.

I'm surprised that they are allowed to get away with that. In America of all places!

I expect one or two of them may of been sued since...

I've recently been alerted to something which was probably obvious to most others (but not to me) so thought I'd share it here in case anyone else was as naive as myself.

In your profile options on this forum there are two settings relating to privacy of your registered email address.

The first is [B]allow vCard download[/B], which says "if you want to keep your email address private, do not allow vCard downloads".

"Fair enough", I thought, "I DO want to keep my email address private, so I'll disable this option".

The second is [B]receive email from other members[/B].

"Ah," I thought, "this therefore allows me to keep my email address private, but lets other forum members send me email via the forum. That's quite safe & potentially useful, so I'll enable that option".

My (incorrect) assumption was that the sender would compose the text they wish to email and submit it, and the forum software would then send an email containing that text to my email address [I]but without the sender actually seeing the recipient address[/I].

Well, I was wrong. If you enable this second option, it allows any other member to click on "send email to Pigro" and they then get the email client on their own computer popping up with MY (supposedly private) email address already pre-selected as the recipient.

As I say, perhaps this what most people would expect to happen, but it was a total surprise to me. If I select an option which claims to "keep my address private", I expect that to be the case regardless of any other optional settings I may make, which unfortunately isn't the case in practice.

Doing a quick check on the other people who have posted in this thread, only Torchiarolan has left this option enabled. Torch - I wonder if you did this intentionally or, like me, you weren't aware that it basically displays your email address to any registered member who is interested?

... I've just realised that this warning alone may not mean that much to some less tech minded forum members.

What I'm driving at is that, if you've registered an email address which has your surname as an obvious component within it, and you've ever given your (real) Christian name within any posts here (or maybe as your signature) ... then I could fairly quickly start to find out some quite personal stuff about you if you leave the email address visible. I won't go into detail, but while checking this out with a few random members on other threads, I was able to find out a members full home address from their email address - it took literally less than 1 minute to do that. I'll PM that member in case they wish to reconsider the email facility - or at least change their registered email address here to something less potentially compromising.

no problems Torch. Actually I am still in a bit of a dilemma here - I wasn't sure whether just to PM Ronald on ther QT or put something in the Circulo. Ronald sometimes takes a while to respond to PM's (and its still holiday season) so on balance I thought it better to risk publicising the "flaw" (as I'll now term it given that its not only me who misunderstood!) rather than wait to see if Ronald would intervene (and if so, whether he would/could do anything about it). If anyone thinks that posting this info is actually making things worse (by making others aware of a potential exploit) then use the "report post" button on my original post about the issue - that way , Ronald will be alerted and can decide if my info should be deleted. Meantime, I think making people aware is the lesser of 2 evils.

Pigro - thanks for pointing this out.

I've updated the wording to make it clear that your e-mail address will be visible as a result.

[quote=pigro;79829] Actually I am still in a bit of a dilemma here - I wasn't sure whether just to PM Ronald on ther QT or put something in the Circulo. Ronald sometimes takes a while to respond to PM's (and its still holiday season) so on balance I thought it better to risk publicising the "flaw" (as I'll now term it given that its not only me who misunderstood!) rather than wait to see if Ronald would intervene (and if so, whether he would/could do anything about it). If anyone thinks that posting this info is actually making things worse (by making others aware of a potential exploit) then use the "report post" button on my original post about the issue - that way , Ronald will be alerted and can decide if my info should be deleted. Meantime, I think making people aware is the lesser of 2 evils.[/quote]

Just though I'd answer this as well. I think the best thing would be to have PM'ed me directly first. I could then update the wording and send out a post to everyone updating them on this.

Rather than make the assumption that I will simply not reply it is best to try first. If you see that I have not replied in what you consider to be an appropriate time period - then you could proceed to make this public.

"You can allow other members to send you email messages.

Receive Email from Other Members (Attention this will make you e-mail address visible to registered members of the forums)"

Second part has a typo. Also sorry have I missed soething??? Only by sending e-mail will your address come to light surely???

OK, Ronald, fair point. I will PM 1st in future (though this was a bit of a one off situation hopefully!)

[quote=turtle;79833]Also sorry have I missed soething??? Only by sending e-mail will your address come to light surely???[/quote]

correct, only if someone clicks on your forum name, sees that you have left email enabled and then clicks on "send email" would they then see your address. But he wouldn't need to actually sent you an email, he'd see your address and could then just close the new message without sending.

On the assumption that an ID fraudster or whoever was lurking around, that's exactly what he would be doing - harvest a few obvious email addresses, grab the postal addresses from them, possibly also obtain the members date of birth (if they've left that info visible too) ... and hey presto, your ID is gone.

[QUOTE=turtle;79833............sorry have I missed soething??? Only by sending e-mail will your address come to light surely???[/QUOTE]

No sally - if anyone clicks on 'send an e-mail to turtle' [or whatever the actual wording is], your e-mail address does come upon the screen

I've know about this for ages.

Erratum- known

Turtle, I'm sure most folk probably knew about it, but some (like Torch & me) had missed the significance. I thought it better to alert the few & bore the many than leave it unclear.

ps. I thought you'd got your edit priviledges back?

Thanks, Pigro. I didn't know & box is now unticked! Good job of you raising this.

Cheers...

Sorry Pigro, It was indeed very thoughtful you. Thank you for reminding me of my "Edit" button..

I'll add my thanks to Pigro too.

The new message will explain things to new members registering but without making it public I don't expect many existing members revisit their options and would have noticed the change. Even with this thread there will be an awful lot of people who won't realise their email address is openly visible. It is a bit like shutting the stable door after the horse has bolted on the other hand better late than never!

[quote=ronald;79832]I could then update the wording and send out a post to everyone updating them on this. [/quote]

Nielo, I do intend to message everyone and let them know about this...

Thank you Ronald, good idea.

[quote=alan h;79840]No sally - if anyone clicks on 'send an e-mail to turtle' [or whatever the actual wording is], your e-mail address does come upon the screen[/quote]

Have you had your surname surgically shortened recently by any chance?

I had to double check with google's cache to ensure my eyes weren't playing tricks on me ...

I think it is very useful and sensible of pigro to have alerted people to this potential (perhaps not explicity explained) intrusion into their security, but at the same time I do think it is rather unwise to use a 'prime' e-mail address in any sort of connection with a forum (even including revealing it to the administration).

How many mouse clicks does it take to become pigro @ hotmail. com? About four, and twenty seconds worth of typing. (And yes, the spaces in the potential e-mail address are deliberate!)

[quote=pigro;79862]Have you had your surname surgically shortened recently by any chance?

I had to double check with google's cache to ensure my eyes weren't playing tricks on me ...[/quote]

yep - took your advice given earlier today.

I for one hadn't realised how easy it was to extrapolate e-mail addresses etc, so made it slightly harder.

In same way that some time ago I 'unfocussed' the details given in my profile to make it less easy to work out where my place was etc etc. [and yes - i know that anyone with a modicum of computer 'nouse' can still get the details - but hey!, why make it easy?]

Once again - thanks for the 'nudge'

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So - Alan - you have been able to edit your user name? That seems somewhat bizarre (not your decision, just your ability to have done that). So, if I were to access your user profile, or to search on posts made by Alan H***** (so I will play your game for a moment) - what results? Have you checked? How does the database cope?

Its so simple to change your name - you just PM ronald and ask him to do it. [I remembered him posting that he could do that some time ago.]

The changes seem to go back to all posts [I checked one I made 6 months ago]

I'm sure anyone with the required expertise can short circuit the changes if they wanted to - but why would they? [thats a rhetorical question - no response necessary]

,

[quote=Charles Phillips;79875]
How many mouse clicks does it take to become pigro @ hotmail. com? About four, and twenty seconds worth of typing. (And yes, the spaces in the potential e-mail address are deliberate!)[/quote]

argh! my secret identity is revealed! Again! :winki:

So can I assume you're not really Charles Phillips, president of Oracle Corporation then? Damn! I was hoping for a free relational database if I threatened to out you :-)

[quote=alan h;79877]yep - took your advice given earlier today.

I for one hadn't realised how easy it was to extrapolate e-mail addresses etc, so made it slightly harder.

In same way that some time ago I 'unfocussed' the details given in my profile to make it less easy to work out where my place was etc etc. [and yes - i know that anyone with a modicum of computer 'nouse' can still get the details - but hey!, why make it easy?]

Once again - thanks for the 'nudge'

.[/quote]

Alan, it might be worth removing your ‘grazies’, if you can be bothered, as they still show your full name.

To add to Nielo's suggestion about checking your 'grazies' - maybe some of your posts have been 'quoted' in which case your original name will appear, and there is little you could do to remedy that! Though, to be honest, you would have to be severely paranoid to worry about these nuances of identification vis a vis potential identity theft (IMO).

agreed charles and it was well worth you reassuring Alan.

Alan - just to clarify, my original point was about 'privacy' as per the thread title as much as security. Even if someone is in possession of your full name, (unless it's highly unique) it's generally only possible to start finding out info like home address, place of work etc. if you've previously divulged that elsewhere - think social or professional networking sites, on line C.V.'s, planning applications and the like.

Given that kind of info, general purpose or more specific 'people finding' search engines can be used to throw up potential matches on your name in combination with any other related info (like region, age etc.) that they may have gleaned about you.

It's not likely in the first instance that you'd be randomly targeted by ID thieves just for having a 'proper' forum name on our little forum - but as you said yourself there's no point in taking chances regardless.

However, if you'd rubbed someone else here up the wrong way, and that person had a malicious streak, then having your email, real name, region etc. would be a good starting point for them to make mischief - again, better prevented at source than left to deal with in the highly unlikely event that it came to pass.

I, like Charles, would not worry unduly about a few historic quotes or grazies remaining here as long as your email, DOB, and specific location within piemonte are all private (which they seem to be). Time to relax and have a nice glass of wine to kick off your weekend, sorry if I've put the heebie jeebies up anyone here.

[quote=pigro;79926]..................Time to relax and have a nice glass of wine to kick off your weekend, sorry if I've put the heebie jeebies up anyone here.[/quote]

Message received and understood - relaxing has started - on my 2nd Scotch as I type.

[quote=ronald;79849]Nielo, I do intend to message everyone and let them know about this...[/quote]

Has anyone got a message about this.....?

[quote=Nielo;80444]Has anyone got a message about this.....?[/quote]

try PM'ing ronald

[quote=alan h;80468]try PM'ing ronald[/quote]

Wasn't Ron supposed to PM us?