Be careful what you reveal here!

[Miss Mandy]

Dear Ladies,

Just a word of caution. Recently, in an episode of paranoia coupled with insomnia, I decided to try an experiment. I searched my previous posts and selected seemingly harmless biographical details I had posted from all forums on the site. Using a legal pad for notes and online search engines, I was able to devise a method to deduce my identity very quickly. Big deal you say, you were searching for yourself...duh...Now granted, I am a card carrying member so I can see things here that Joe Stalker can't out in drab land. Nevertheless, this should give you pause.

I then took this method and applied it to others on this forum. I was able to quickly deduce and confirm the identity of quite a few members here! If you are deep in the closet and do not want to be discovered, please, please, please be careful what you decide to share here. I am not the sharpest knife in the drawer and if I can do this, individuals and organizations with far greater intelligence and resources can as well...

With that said, my hobbies are backgammon, origami, and butterfly collecting. I live north of the Gulf of Mexico and south of the Canadian border. I am 79 years old and a retired supervisor in the frozen food industry...))

Hugs,

Miss Mandy

P.S. Keep your caches clean, search histories wiped, check your facebook settings, and make sure your photo share is turned off on your Apple mobile devices (that one almost outed me a work a few years back!)

[Alice Torn]

Nothing surprises me anymore. a little scary. Hopefully no one will use our info to expose, hurt anyone on here. A scary time we live in. The best of times, and the worst of times.

[Krisi]

That goes for anything you put on the Internet anywhere. Once you put something on the Internet, you lose control of it. Put a photo on this site and anyone who can see it (members) can download it to their own computer and then upload it somewhere else. And yes, if you post your hometown and hobbies or other personal information, you can be identified.

Some folks don't care if they are outed and that's fine for them. Others stand to lose jobs, marriages and standing in their communities.

I would love to be able to post photos of my outfits and outings but I just can't take the risk.

BTW: MY avatar photo is actually a photo of me but I would be pretty hard to recognize from that angle.

[Amy Fakley]

So aaah ... what was your method?
I'm curious

[Stephanie47]

For starters input the handle you use on this site into the search engines and see what crops up. Use the "all" and "images" functions and just follow the road. You may find reviews of products and comments made on forums. I guess if you're an IT person you may be able to crack someones IP address. With the current acknowledged hacking occurring in the real world I guess nobody is safe. Give it a try. I've done it myself. Just log all the way off and make sure all cookies are gone to make it a little more challenging.

[JenniferMBlack]

If your going through that much trouble to find information about me you probably already know.

[ellbee]

OMG! Apparently I've been murdered!!

[EllieOPKS]

Mandy. I just did an image search on you and an image search on me. The good news - the like images of you were ALL hot! The bad news - mine were all demented. LOL.
I would seriously like to post a pic of me but this very issue haunts me to much. I once posted a pic of me on another forum and the next thing I know someone is making posts using my picture so I am reluctant to ever post pics. The irony is I love looking at the girls here. So many are so attractive.

[Rhonda Jean]

I made the simple error of logging in to my personal email through my work computer. I didn't realize for a long time that that opened up my entire online life to anyone who could get into my work computer, especially given the saved passwords. As far as I know, I fixed that before it was discovered. I have sworn off of posting pictures ANYWHERE, and deleted every picture I could online, and even attempted to delete them all from my computer. Takes a lot of the fun out of it, I must say!

I went through a phase of DGAF, followed by a still-persisting phase of GAF! The problem is that some of the stuff from the DGAF period is not undoable when I got to the GAF period.

Another thing... I checked where the logins had come from on my Yahoo account, which I only used for my girl email. There had been multiple logins from placed I'd never been. I deleted that account, and haven't opened up another.

Years ago, may have even been in the dial-up era when I first was discovering online forums I joined an online community that was all about long hair and hair styling. You had to submit a photo to even gain access. I was still using a film camera, so I had to take photos, have them developed, take them to Kinko's and have them scanned to disc, then load them on my computer and post them. I posted a number of photos there of me in curlers, in the salon, and resulting styles. Long after that site dissolved I googled my name and those photos were still in images. I suppose they're still out there somewhere, but I can't find them just going into images.

[brenda girl]

My job would check every site you went on periodically so I just went to a library to check things out

[sara66]

I don't worry to much about privacy. This is the only place I have ever posted anything. I have no social media. I belong to no other forums. I have really never joined anything. I tend not to be a people person.
I have become less paranoid about be discovered as I have gotten older.
Sara

[Tracii G]

I have done searches like that and never found any damning evidence.

[DIANEF]

I don't worry to much about privacy. This is the only place I have ever posted anything. I have no social media. I belong to no other forums. I have really never joined anything. I tend not to be a people person.
I have become less paranoid about be discovered as I have gotten older.
Sara

Second that completely. I am on facebook but not with my real name, nothing else, and I think most of us would hesitate to post something too glaringly obvious about themselves without meaning to.

[Kate Simmons]

It's a "given" to me that others know who I am. Especially the FBI, CIA and NSA. Not sure about the KGB but hey all they hafta do is ask.

[Josie]

What do you mean by confirming the identity of some members? Could you confirm that I'm Joann Kelly from the midwest and I go by the screen name Josie or are you talking about my male name?

[Dana44]

Ah Ha ha, Yeah if you look me up on the internet I am a part number for a jeep gear linkages. So go ahead and try it. And I have never posted a picture. But if someone searched all of my threads., I don't think you will be able to figure my name out. I do keep my cookies cleaned out and the caches cleaned.

[Miss Mandy]

Dear Ladies,

I did not mean to alarm anyone but yes, I was able to connect some individuals on this forum with their male persona Facebook pages, twitter accounts, etc.

This site is very secure! However, many ladies here release small and distinctive details in their posts and in their biographies that can easily be put together. In my former life, my job was to collect, cross reference, and synthesize data. It did this in research libraries and museums. The subject of research does not matter really. In the end, the processes are the same. My advice would be if you have distinctive hobbies, if you reveal what you do for a living, or you should casually mention what your spouse does, you are subject to discovery. Combine that with your actual given place of residence and actual age, and other personal biographical details, and you can be outed very easily if the will to make the effort exists.

Like many of you, I have so very much to lose if my female persona was revealed. Apart from my wife, no one else knows and I want to keep it that way.

[FrannGurl]

Something I found out, as far as being outed by Facebook was this:

I have used OkCupid and a few other sites, as well as Craigslist in the past to meet men for dating.
While Craigslist may not been the greatest place for dating, I have had success with it and even had a 7 relationship come out of it.

But here's the thing....

I have exchanged pictures with men I would consider dating and have exchanged a few emails, no big deal. Most of them I didn't meet for one reason or another, but awhile later,Ill look at Facebook and it will say "People you may know"... then I see a picture here and there from someone I had emailed, which tells me, that on their end they may also see my facebook picture, I was a bit creeped out by this at first, but then figured if they never saw me in drab, they would probably figure I'm just a friend or a friend or something...Also I use Gmail, so I don't know if that has anything to do with it or not.

Not exactly the same thing you are talking about. but I figured it had to do with being outed or identified online so I thought it was worth sharing.

[Kate Simmons]

So Mandy if you figured out who I am, tell me by PM. I'm curious.

[Lorileah]

This morning I opened my front door and campaign propaganda fell out. Tiz the seaon. But hand written on one was my name...big green letters...LoriLeah. So here's what I deduced. Anyone trying hard enough can find out what your name is, where you live, what you ate for breakfast and all about that tattoo you got while in Mexico. If you're buried so deep that you don't want anyone to know who you are, go off grid. Pictures here? Who would WANT them. They are vanilla plain photos, often I even question if they really belong to the poster. You want my male name (for what it's worth), I gave it up 19 months ago. It's on Facebook with my account for "him". You can check other sites, I'm not shy.

Remember, the only place muggles can see without joining are the open areas here. If a member EVER gets caught stealing photos and especially USING said photos else where, they will be an EX-member here. Wikileaks has copies of all my emails. And, honestly, why in the name of Carmen Miranda would anyone take the time to dig that deep into anyone here? Nothing on this site is illegal. But just to be safe, maybe you oughta tell the missus and save her lawyer the time Mandy spent find herself.

[Joan58]

I just did a Google search for Joan58. In the images that appeared found none of my photos,but there was one image that I recognized as a regular poster to these forums.

[AlyssaJ]

I cannot stress how important this really is, especially for those of you that are worried about being outed. In my line of work, this is what we call Open Source Intelligence (OSINT), data you are able to gather on a person through freely available tools. Using advanced Google search operators, one can conduct what they call "Google Hacking" which can gain large amounts of information about a person very quickly.

That said, I probably share more here than I should and I very likely could be found out. The thing is I'm at a point that I'm out to my wife, coming out to my family and at some point will be coming out to certain friends. So I'm not horribly worried that someone who knows me may want to spend the time doing that to discover me.

One note, not to minimize the seriousness of this, but remember Mandy that you do have certain insider knowledge of this site and our interactions that does help bias your searches to make it easier to discover things. That's not to suggest that an "outsider" couldn't gain that same knowledge, but it does impact the speed and effectiveness of discovering information.

[sometimes_miss]

Ah Ha ha, Yeah if you look me up on the internet I am a part number for a jeep gear linkages. So go ahead and try it. And I have never posted a picture. But if someone searched all of my threads., I don't think you will be able to figure my name out. I do keep my cookies cleaned out and the caches cleaned.

I thought you were an axle/differential, most commonly found on 1/2 ton pickups, but also on select other vehicles, even corvettes! The name Dana 44 is famous among the motorheads among us. One of your sisters resides in the front twin traction beam of my truck. There are pictures of you all over the net. Dana44.jpg

[Lorileah]

so is Dana a "rear end"?

[dolovewell]

I know I am on government watch lists already.