Privacy on MSE

peachyprice

I think the it's mostly people who also use the same or very similar alias here as on facebook who are most at risk of being identified. No point in keeping details of yourself to a minimum here if you're goint to slap all your private business over FB.

GobbledyGook

I think on here you either have to say virtually nothing (or change enough details about yourself to be unrecognisable) or accept that what you write could be seen by anyone who knows you.

I go with the latter. I'm pretty recognisable to anyone who knows my life so I make sure I only post things I don't mind acquaintances knowing (as the situations were ones that were heavily discussed with my family and friends anyway) even if I wouldn't necessarily have the conversation with them normally. For me that was a trade off for the good that the opinions given here in tough situations have give me.

itsanne

ringo_24601 wrote: »

I often find people reuse their alias names, so you can search for info on them in other sites

I've never looked. Why have you ?

I don't post anything I'd be upset about anyone I know reading - even though I'd rather they didn't know it was me. It can be surprising what people divulge on occasion :eek: :eek: .

anotheruser

I don't re-use usernames generally.
Some forums allow you to have a different "Display Name", so to all intent and purposes, you can have the same sign-in name but different Displayed Names to make things more secure.

On the internet, the only things which have my real name is email, facebook and twitter.

Gloomendoom

I wouldn't lose any sleep if anybody that I know read any of my MSE posts.

I made a couple of posts on the eBay forum that prompted a couple of people to fruitlessly search for my MSE username on eBay so that they could block me as a buyer.

Georgiegirl256

I think you've got to be so careful online nowadays. Some people don't realise how much info they are giving away about themselves, which would quite possibly make it fairly easy to track someone down if a person was that way inclined.

tyllwyd

I try to stay reasonably private but both my sister and my daughter have come across my posts and realised it was me. What surprises me most are people on the house selling board, who post links to the estate agents details for their own house. I'm surprised the moderators don't pick up on it - I'm sure if you posted up your name and phone number they would remove it.

daisiegg

tyllwyd wrote: »

I try to stay reasonably private but both my sister and my daughter have come across my posts and realised it was me. What surprises me most are people on the house selling board, who post links to the estate agents details for their own house. I'm surprised the moderators don't pick up on it - I'm sure if you posted up your name and phone number they would remove it.

Why? Isn't it someone's own choice if they want to share personal information?

Georgiegirl256

daisiegg wrote: »

Why? Isn't it someone's own choice if they want to share personal information?

It is, but websites always advise against it, and IMO it's abit daft to do so.

[Deleted User]

itsanne wrote: »

I've never looked. Why have you ?

I don't post anything I'd be upset about anyone I know reading - even though I'd rather they didn't know it was me. It can be surprising what people divulge on occasion :eek: :eek: .

Dunno, I'm inquisitive and occasionally want to find 'ammo' against trolls. I've always had a great ability to 'find stuff' about people online.

When we were selling our house I managed to use Facebook in our favour when negotiating a price.

I'm sneaky I am