Not to put too fine a point on it, but creeps don't stop at googling your name.  If you have ever run a race and I know what it is and I know your name (or your time in that race, and voila, I now know your name) I can find out how old you are and what town you are in.  I can also send an unassuming email to a race director, and if I'm 1) sincere sounding and 2) he/she is gullible or lazy, I can probably get your email address and whatever mailing address you used.  And if I can't, well, I still know what town you live in and sites like spokeo work wonders.

 

I can do some stuff with your email address.  Like pretend to be you.  Or sign you up for things.  Or use that on various sites I bet you use to see if it is your sign-in ID.  And if I get one of those to work, I probably have your credit card number.  And a confirmation of your address.  And perhaps the address of people you've shipped stuff to.  And information about your family.  Et cetera.

 

You don't want to know what kinds of social engineering can be done with a physical mailing address.  Or publicly available documents like deeds.

 

BTW, I am using "I" as shorthand.  Real-life "I" (me) would not do this.  But it ain't that hard if someone is motivated.

 

Incidentally, to those of you who are ever in a relationship with someone and you aren't sure if she/he is telling the truth about relationship status, check for deeds.  Public info, and some entities put this out on the web for everyone to see. You might find that she/he is listed as "married" in a deed for a house somewhere.  That's always a pleasant conversation.

 

Ask me how I know.  Sigh.

Wow.  I knew I liked you, SRL, but I didn't realize that it was because we had lived the same life....

Actually, several of you have in fact put me into an interesting boundaries conversation with real world people, yes.

Hope she didn't spank you...unless you wanted her too, that is.

Seriously, hope we didn't get you in trouble.

SRL, I don't think I want to ask how you know...

I Google myself a lot, just to be up on things (it's almost all race results and some of my local court cases in the news).  I also use a different user name for message boards than is in any of my past or present e-mail addresses, and I register for things online, like message boards, with a separate e-mail, not the e-mail that I use for friends, family, and close-relationship purposes.  I post pictures from time to time but it's pretty much just a face, you know?  I try to keep the most personal details to a minimum.  I keep my name out of things because I deal with lots of gangbangers and scums at work everyday and it's a legitimate worry that someday some vengeful drug dealer might want to put a bullet in my head.  This is one reason I don't like naming a lot of the particular races I do, unless they're very large--Runner's World is HIGHLY Googlable.

I learned a lot of stuff working at DMV. Lots.

We were a multi-line access point for Vital Stats and Land Registry as well as the driver

licencing and motor vehicle transactions..

As SRL there are many many ways people can find stuff out about you.

Then they are people who don't know much about the people closest to them.

I will never forget the poor lady whose husband had died and left her with 4 kids, she was a SAHM. They had

been common law for 15 years. She never knew that he had not divorced his previous wife. He left no will and

everything w as in his name.. She had no legal rights  to anything. She wanted me to transfer the car to her

name and I couldn't do it. She was crying. It was very sad.

I have a theory that, decades from now, our grandchildren will be able to read each and every thing that any of us ever posted on the web. 

Everything.  All of our posts or private messages on RunningAhead, RWOL, or any other site.  All of our interactions on dating sites.  All of our emails.  Everything. 

Whether or not they would actually want to take the time to research or read these things is another story altogether, but there is a real possibility that they will have access to all of it. 

My advice is to live your life as though you're being watched.  I use Facebook, because it's an invaluable tool for organizing things with the local running community and just for having fun in general, but I have a policy not to post anything that I would not want my late grandparents or a prospective employer to see.  I'm not saying that I've never done stupid things online, but I do acknowledge that fact that I've done so belongs to the world now instead of belonging only to me. 

Along the lines of what Jason said...I am actually friends with my boss on Facebook, so that keeps me in check.  No crazy partying photos or status updates, nothing like that.  So, every time I do something on FB, I have to ask myself, "do I mind if the boss sees this?" 

Along the lines of what Jason said...I am actually friends with my boss on Facebook, so that keeps me in check.  No crazy partying photos or status updates, nothing like that.  So, every time I do something on FB, I have to ask myself, "do I mind if the boss sees this?" 

 I always thought there is something inherently incongruous about something that is supposed to be social platform where you meet, converse and share things with friends that at the same time records your every action word and posting, and stores these things in a way that makes them, on some level,  available for retrieval till the end of time.