This is not Private!

Bleu
Mar 29, 2007 at 9:56 AM
28 comments

This last week I have found two friends in my neighbourhood here in VOX have gotten into trouble because of things they have posted in their VOX. One had serious problems in her personal life and the other in her place of employment. I am hoping that both of them have these problems work out in a satisfactory manner. However it seems I find myself needing to do a public service message. And remind everyone That even if you make all your posts hidden they are still not one hundred percent safe and private. A very important rule of thumb is if you put it online assume it will be found when it is least convenient for you by the last person you would want to see it. Also remeber that the internet is forever, even if take something down, there is a record of what used to be there and it can be found. Now some of you are probably going 'He's blowing it out of proportion.' to you I say people have been fired because of post in their private blogs, people have been court marshaled and dishonourably discharged from the service, and they have had their personal lives destroyed by things they put in their blogs. So if you absolutely find that you must write down things that you could come back to harm you, buy a diary it's the only safe way. So please practise safe blogging, I don;t want to read about any other friends who have had their lives turned upside down by their blogs, that's not what this is supposed to be about.

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Excellent Post! Thanks for putting it out there. We would all do well to remember this fact. Also, best to never mention names, places of employment, etc...

Thanks Crom for the additional advise. I normally don't 'share' my posts cause it seems pushy to me but I thought this was important enough to remind everyone I know. If any of you agree this is important, why not suggest this is good to VOX and maybe they will put it on the "this is good" page.

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yep. so right. i would be one who has had an issue with it. thankfully i never wrote anything personal or specific in any way - but, still...posts were found that were deleted long ago. also - other blogs i deleted are still in feeds on the internet and cannot be erased. do not put anything on here you don't expect to be found - not even hidden.

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Very true, thanks for reminding us of this. I know I've been guilty of bareing my personal life online.

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Yep anything you put on the web is available to the public at large, I always see people getting bent outta shape over "their” Images being posted elsewhere... if you don't want something appropriated by someone else. Don’t post it on the web.
I’m usually pretty careful about what I write, not always, but it would only piss off people that have no influence over my life

Unless I get really paranoid and start worrying about the government....

Thanks for spotting the double post, oops I removed the duplicate.

Unless there is a reason for the "government" to be watching you I don't think you need to worry, yes they are watching everyone but its automated and a actual person only looks at your stuff if you say certain trigger words alot, otherwise your just an anonymous blip and not worth human attention from the "government".

LOl I was just playing devils advocate.. I can be as paranoid as the next guys, but I'm not that paranoid, alhtough when they're out to get ya paranoid is just good sense ;)

Are they out to get you wicked? What did you do, this time?

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Yes it is always hard to keep anything truly private anymore -- you almost have to create a profile that contains no personal identifiers and no photos that would locate you. A lot of times I want to share something with certain friends but then i get parinoid that I'll uncheck private at some point and screw myself up.

Yeah even then if some one was really dedicated they could probably track it back to you. You just have to hope no one ever really wants to that badly.

Well said! In addition, there is in our lexicon the word 'Dooce' and its relative verb 'to be dooced' which corelates to the firing of Heather Armstrong because of her blog at dooce.com. Since then, the 'Petite Anglaise' who lives in France but is from England was dooced, and she is going to court for compensation. It's a messy thing to believe you have anonymity when you are writing about your real life online. True anonymity is had by posting complete fabrication... which is traceable, but can be legally argued as fiction writing.

Egad, the age we live in, LOL

True anonymity can only be achieved offline.
Oh and in case you were wondering privacy does not exist any more, even in the offline world, the average person in any city in North America is caught more than 30 times each and every day on camera. Got to love CCV, smile now.

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I couldn't agree more. I recently wrote a blog entry about how there's really no such thing as privacy on the internet. http://adorkable.vox.com/library/post/the-internet-privacy-fallacy.html

As much as we'd all love to believe we can trust the people we let read our private entries, there's always at least one that's willing to give that information out to the unprivileged. :/

That's scary to think about, and it makes me very glad I rarely leave my house anymore!

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There is no such thing as privacy period. Big brother is watching. Collecting and filtering phone calls, intercepting emails and many other things. Just Google Privacy and you'll see all the government and world wide programs to collect data on anyone not living in the stone age. The only way to be truly "private" is to go off the reservation and live a self sustainable lifestyle and use no modern communication tools.

For the rest of us, the pen is a powerful weapon, and your post is spot on. In building a web persona, it's important to do responsibly (unless you want regrets down the road) and in an enlightened fashion...

I think you are talking about me (the whole work crap) and the only issue my work had was the fact that I used the name of my work. For some reason my brain wasn't working when I typed it. From now on, I have learned my lesson, and will never post the name of where I work. *sigh* all the BS that has been happening at work is because of ONE STUPID PERSON!!! Argh, she drives me nuts. (see Skank) names have been changed to protect the Not Innocent.

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You are so right Fallen Anjel. I need to think about what I put on my blog more clearly now! I'm glad you posted this and I hope the things with your friends all turn out fine! This is very important and I think may share it with some of my other friends! :-)

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[Nice Work- Wonderful to see this post] You hit the nail on the head.

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I try not to get too personal in writing in my blog but yes people are always watching and phishing and god knows what else they call it or do.
We have millions of cctv cameras in the Uk...luckily I live in the middle of nowhere with nary a camera or traffic light around and I am just anti social enough to be private...the internet id def my exposed side...hell even when it was just me and my diary when I was 7 I am sure my mum read it. The only thought that is private is the one you haven't had yet....and I am sure they will invent something one day to proove me wrong in that!

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True Dat!

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very true. i've just recently had a bit of a snafu . . . although it seems to have resolved, make sure to check security levels before reposting year-old posts.

Thank you for posting this. It is such a good reminder. I sometimes re read my blog and delete things just in case.

Bleu replied to Tired Working Mom’s comment:
Apr 4, 2007
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Even if you delete something your not safe, anything you ever put online remains forever even if you delete it there is a copy somewhere and people will find it at the least convenient time to you. Checkout the wayback machine for more info.

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Indeed. What people just cannot get is that no matter how many times they select "private," lock down with a password in diary7and, or mark "friends only" at 7ivejournal, it is not really "secret."

I wouldn't have believed, either, going by the FAQs on journal providers. However...When I got a real life stalker who got enough data by combining a stalker's natural tendencies with computer knowledge entered my locked/ marked private journal entries. That stuff was my diary. It was really, really, really meant as a way for me to "talk through" horrible things that were done to me as a kid. The sick individual then had "everything." And used it. The police can do nothing about this. They told me, "Just because you put things in a paper bag on the street, it's not private. You've made it public property by placing it there. The internet is a public domain...all of it."

[this is good]

Great post :D

Anything you write down can be seen by other eyes. Online or offline. Isn't that common sense?

I forget who said it first but "Common Sense" is very "Uncommon".

This is not Private!

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