Some Quitting Facebook as Privacy Concerns Escalate

[Really]

Test Your Facebook Privacy Settings

This one was posted on Mashable yesterday. I checked it out and it says I have everything locked down that should be. It's very easy to use.

[Prancer]

Openbook is certainly interesting.

[Really]

Openbook is certainly interesting.

Just reading about that one on a blog right now. I used the ReclaimPrivacy tool.

ETA: Just checked it -- nope, I didn't show up!

[numbers123]

Openbook is certainly interesting.

I didn't show up either - and I updated a status a minute before searching which should have shown up. also seached for a status that one of my friends had and they showed up.

And I am very tired right now and can't focus on all the privacy settings listed in test your privacy settings. Will check later in the day.

A statement in one of the articles concerned me - and that was the "temporary" glich of someone being able to see a live chat with another person. That is someone who had not been involved in your chat could see what you were chatting with another person. I wondered about that around the time it was reported to be a problem based upon a live chat experience I had. Plus I am beginning to wonder if it doesn't show up with other upgrades to the privacy changes. One experience was about 18 months ago and another one was about 6 months ago.

[Angelskates]

I can't get the testing site to show?

ETA: I got it to work, thanks!

good you are opted-out of the Instant Personalization feature
good all of your personal information is at restricted to your friends or closer
good all of your contact information is at restricted to your friends or closer
good all of your friends, tags, and connections information is at restricted to your friends or closer
good your friends are protected from accidentally sharing your personal information
good you have blocked all known applications that could leak your personal information

I am assuming that there's only "good" and "bad"?

[*Jen*]

That spooky spokeo site determines where a person lives based on where your ISP address is. Totally random guess. My family and I worked this out when we all showed up in the same European city when I searched, and same Australian suburb when they searched. Neither were correct

My flatmate found some stuff about herself and her family on there, so she's going to register a fake email and have them take it off.

[Ziggy]

Another awesome tool to check and fix your FB privacy settings.
http://www.reclaimprivacy.org/facebook

[El Rey]

ut on Facebook and come after you.

That said, some articles about Facebook and privacy:

Test Your Facebook Privacy Settings

Thanks for sharing this! I thought I was totally private but found I was sharing some stuff. I was wondering how one of my friends was able to know what I had written on a Yelp review, although this person wouldn't have known I was on Yelp, because the "junk" email address I use for this type of stuff is only visible to me on Facebook, so he wouldn't have been able to search for me that way since no one knows that email. It's because facebook was sharing my information with Yelp!

That's what's making me mad about all these privacy updates. They keep making stuff about you public without your permission!

[kwanfan1818]

From the Openbook article:

The fact that privacy controls led to a potential security problem, as well as the recent privacy changes when mixed with the “Like” feature, there have been reports on what appears to be a major backlash against Facebook. Yet, despite more than 3,000 pledges from people to delete their profiles over privacy concerns, the backlash appears to be held to a vocal minority.

For the last several days, FB has been trying to get me to attach profile information to specific pages. (I guess most of my favorite books don't have pages, nor does my interest in gastroporn .)

I finally chose "select individual pages" (or whatever they call it), unchecked every recommendation, and updated. I then got a message to say that my profile would be blank if I confirmed, which I did.

My profile has, indeed, been wiped away from the page view. I didn't even have to bother to do it myself. However, they still have the data, and I'm sure they'll sell and share it until the cows come home.

[Andora]

Thanks for the privacy scan, Prancer. I had thought I was still all closed off, but alas, parts of my profile were open to everyone.

I'd get mad that Facebook continues to mess with my profile, but it is their site, and I suppose they get to make the rules. I'm not too concerned about what I have up there, as it's not much, but it's still frustrating.

[Prancer]

I can't get the testing site to show?I am assuming that there's only "good" and "bad"?

No, there's good, bad and caution, with links to where you might need to adjust settings.

Another awesome tool to check and fix your FB privacy settings.
http://www.reclaimprivacy.org/facebook

That's actually the same one

Thanks for the privacy scan, Prancer. I had thought I was still all closed off, but alas, parts of my profile were open to everyone.

Some of my stuff is open, too, but I left it that way. I want people to be able to search for me, and I want them to be able to send me Friend requests. I don't see much point in Facebook otherwise, but that's me.

Openbook is hilarious. I put in the name of the college I officially work for, the organization I really work for and the name of my teaching center, and . I didn't come across any of my students, amazingly enough (it's a small program; everyone knows everyone), but I did find a lot of stuff from other students I may run into one day.

A lot of people are now putting things in their status messages that will make them show up on Openbook, which creates some pretty funny things.

[Satellitegirl]

Just thought I'd say this thread has annoyed me because my brain keeps reading Quitting as Quilting. I must have crafting on the brain or something.

[Angelskates]

My current status didn't show up, (I am "eating cornflakes for dinner,") But it was funny how many people had "cornflakes" in their status!

Prancer, I am not searchable, but am likely going to remove that. A friend and I sat together one day trying to add each other. We both had the highest settings, knew emails etc. We had our security settings too high and had a change them just so we could add each other. Even though we knew each other's email. It was bizarre.

[Really]

More tips on FB privacy...

[Lothlorien]

Question about Spokeo... does one need to join and pay for membership to have info removed? I do not live in North America.

Name search has found one of me, who isn't me, so that's ok. However, I did a search on email addresses as well, and don't like what came up. My old university email gives my full name and age (and links to my NA alma mater, but that's kind of obvious from the email address anyway). I could live with that, but how does it know my age?
What freaked me out is that my personal email address gives a location which is just 5 km away from where I actually do live.

I have moved long distance recently and my birthday was not too long ago and what shows up is accurate... I want that info gone.

[Prancer]

Question about Spokeo... does one need to join and pay for membership to have info removed? I do not live in North America.

Name search has found one of me, who isn't me, so that's ok. However, I did a search on email addresses as well, and don't like what came up. My old university email gives my full name and age (and links to my NA alma mater, but that's kind of obvious from the email address anyway). I could live with that, but how does it know my age?
What freaked me out is that my personal email address gives a location which is just 5 km away from where I actually do live.

I have moved long distance recently and my birthday was not too long ago and what shows up is accurate... I want that info gone.

You don't need to join; somewhere on the site there's an address where you can email a request to remove information. But they will only remove the profile with your name, not your email address and related info--unless things have changed since I got my profile taken down.

You can always try--but be sure to use a one-time, throwaway email address to do it.

Those of you in the US who don't like Spokeo might want to look yourself up on Zabasearch, too. http://www.zabasearch.com/

[Desperado]

Name search has found one of me, who isn't me, so that's ok. However, I did a search on email addresses as well, and don't like what came up. My old university email gives my full name and age (and links to my NA alma mater, but that's kind of obvious from the email address anyway). I could live with that, but how does it know my age?
What freaked me out is that my personal email address gives a location which is just 5 km away from where I actually do live.

I have moved long distance recently and my birthday was not too long ago and what shows up is accurate... I want that info gone.

Thank you - I had searched with my name but not with my email addresses, and just saw that all three are there with a location. I don't want to pay to see the full info but I'm still creeped out by this.

[Prancer]

The location you see on Spokeo is probably the location of your ISP hub, which may or may not be close to your house but is almost certainly in your general vicinity. If you have an email account with your ISP and it is there, then that's what you are seeing.

Openbook is hilarious. I put in the name of the college I officially work for, the organization I really work for and the name of my teaching center, and . I didn't come across any of my students, amazingly enough (it's a small program; everyone knows everyone), but I did find a lot of stuff from other students I may run into one day.

Tried again this morning with a slightly different angle and promptly found three people I actually know, all blathering away. With the first one, I thought "Wow, that woman looks just like [mother of Son's friend]" as well she should have, since it was indeed her.

[*Jen*]

The location you see on Spokeo is probably the location of your ISP hub, which may or may not be close to your house but is almost certainly in your general vicinity. If you have an email account with your IP and it is there, then that's what you are seeing.

Yes. I was freaked out too, until my father searched for my email address from a different country, so got a totally different location. Don't worry about it - it's just the location of your ISP hub, or somewhere nearby, as Prancer said.

Someone searching for you from a different place will get a different result.

[Wyliefan]

In somewhat related news (well, I think it's somewhat related), I left a comment on a news site the other day, identifying myself only with my initials, and then when published, it showed up under my LiveJournal name, with my LJ default avatar and everything. It freaked me out a little. I mean, I've never tried to hide my LJ identity from the world or anything, but when I want to just use my initials, I want to just use my initials and not have their site log me in with one of my social networking accounts! Not to mention that now whenever anyone spams that article, the spam shows up in my e-mail inbox as well. Annoying much?