Cyber-Stalking

[Sunbeam]

Cyber-Stalking

Yikes!!!!

[trixietrack]

Cyber-Stalking

vettech25;298461 wrote: I use this username other places--not youtube--don't do myspace. This is the main reason I haven't told my hubby about this place--he is pretty leary about putting anything private on the Internet. Our son can't even have his picture on his MSN account. I guess I didn't read the fine print...should I have known this could happen? Do you know how I could change my user name here if I decided to?
I hope I'm overreacting, but I have a knot is my stomach!! Yeah, I guess it was stupid--not my real name--but close enough for me. The quitnet site is using my username everytime there is an "anniversary" (3 days, 14 days, 30 days......)I guess I need to unjoin that one, I hardly go there anyway. Like it here better. Thanks for all your help!

check with codemonkey or RJ. you may be able to start all over again with an anomymous name and a different user name and keep your status if you work it out with them.

i agree with not posting your own pic if you are underage. who knows what kind of riff raff is out there stalking.

[Ripple]

Cyber-Stalking

there are posts by ripple butt that ripple is a diiferent one.

[Roberta Jewell]

Cyber-Stalking

Personal information

Hi gang. We've tried to be very clear about this issue because we ferociously guard our members' privacy. When registering, we insist you do not use your name or email address and that you are careful about the personal information you include in your posts.

This is an Internet site, and it is indexed by search engines like Google and Yahoo. It's the only way people who need us can find us. It's probably how you found us. We do our best to create a reasonable balance between forum outreach and member privacy.

I have personally deleted many phone numbers, email addresses and other bits of information when I see them posted. But as membership grows it's impossible to monitor every thread and every message.

We do have one forum (Subscriber) that we are able to place behind a 'firewall' to prevent search engine scanning. It's one of the reasons some of our members choose to spend more time there. It's the only forum we allow posting of personal photos, although like anything else, we urge caution when doing so because membership is also growing in Subscriber. So everyone here must play a role in protecting his or her identity and information.

We want this to be a safe place. A place where you can be honest about your experience and reach out to others. We don't ever want to lose that. But we do ask that you are careful about providing any information that would identify you in any way. And remember that we offer a more private venue for communicating, too: PMs. They are never indexed or read by anyone except for the sender and recipient.

I have changed several of your user names this week as per your requests. (Please do not PM Codemonkey about name changes.) I don't mind doing it, but it can create a number of problems, including member confusion. All posts assigned to a member are automatically changed to that member once the name is updated.

Many forum administrators simply refuse to change user names, but I have felt it is important to honor these requests. Codemonkey tells me he may be able to add a feature so this function is available to everyone and we're looking into it now. We'll try and add it as part of our Third Anniversary celebration, in which we'll introduce some new add-ons. It takes place on Friday.

Hope that helps clear things up.

RJ

[Noelle]

Cyber-Stalking

We'll try and add it as part of our Third Anniversary celebration, in which we'll introduce some new add-ons. It takes place on Friday.

OMG! I can't wait until Friday!!!! How exciting!!!

[Bunch]

Cyber-Stalking

If one is going to post on a public forum they need to understand that it is public before posting. It is your responsibility to cover your trail and make good decisions. I have user names for gaming, others for coding and others for more personal stuff. That way, none of them connect any dots. It's not a good idea to go running all over the net with the same user name. You need to be smart in the real world and also in the virtual world.

It's no different than the real world. In the real world sometimes I am father, sometimes, daddy. There is also Worker, neighbor, friend and enemy versions of me. Each with it's own level of openness and privacy. The only difference on the net is you need to use different names for those divisions to occur.

No member can get your email address or things like that. They don't have access to those things. Never check the box to receive email from others. Always have seperate IM persona's as well. You can use something like Trillian to keep all those in easy reach.

Be smart but not paranoid. The world is not out to get you but a few individuals may be. And more often than not, those individuals are people that know you in real life anyway.

This is pretty funny and scary at the same time.

[ame=

]YouTube - The Guild - Episode 1: Wake-Up Call[/ame]

[4theboyz]

Cyber-Stalking

Thanks everyone for the dose of commonsense. Evidently "I'm" good for selling cell phones, lots of you-tube crud and a pretty good cyber poker player to boot!:H

[Ripple]

Cyber-Stalking

i can ignore the snots!

well this is all good then, i can still get my avatars from another place and they can be pissed all they want! :thanks:

[LVT25]

Cyber-Stalking

Thank you RJ and codemonkey! I feel a little foolish, I probably overreacted, but I really was shocked when I saw all my posts out there for all to see. I haven't posted anything I'm ashamed of, just a little embarressed perhaps. Only my family would put anything together and that wouldn't be that big of a deal--except my hubby would be pissed I was sharing anything personal on the Internet. (rightly so)
Anyway, I hope I haven't caused you all alot of extra work! I guess it's good that more people are aware of this now.

:sorry:

[Roberta Jewell]

Cyber-Stalking

Not a problem

And remember, you can always delete or edit information in your posts afterwards if you feel the need to do so.

RJ

[Ripple]

Cyber-Stalking

The Shik issue.

Question: if this post has any truth can someone randomly attain your IP? other than an administrator of a site? I would like to know.

Back Off

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Back off please from beating up on shik, as hart said what do you want her do; jump into a volcano to make amends.
We know who made the posts, so you cannot hide,My friend [computer nerd] has tracked you down. Via your computer number.
Each time you log on, your number is recorded.
So enjoy your part time hiding, will out you soon.
Until then sleep well
Aunty Vic

really makes you feel safe, doesn't it?

[Roberta Jewell]

Cyber-Stalking

Again...

I responded to this original post in another thread. And I have since been in touch with the member who made this accusation to learn that it was not, in fact, true--no one was traced. In addition, the computer number that is "recorded" is the IP address that is viewable only to administrators. This is done so that we can protect every members who comes here in the event of a security breach.

I would respectfully ask that if anyone here has concerns about site security, that they please contact me.

We go to great lengths to protect every member in this forum. That includes protecting them from information that is inaccurate and misleading.

I would like this to stop.

RJ

[Bunch]

Cyber-Stalking

Ripple, the term "via your computer number" is as meaningless as your shoe size. There is no such term other than some number in the branding name on a sticker pasted to the case. In which case, everyone with the same model has the same number

People that make big claims of bigness are not usually taken too serious. Just think about these type of uberness claims that are made in other areas of life. Some that you may be more expert in. Don't they give you the giggles when you hear them? Well, it's no different when it comes to computers and tech. Just join the rest of us giggling in the background and ignore it.

When you connect to the internet you are assigned an IP by your service provider. Usually that IP changes every single time you re-connect to that provider. Even if someone hacked this site, most IP's they found would be out of date. But for arguments sake, what if they did hack the server and gain the IP address? Which they have not. The most they would find out is the service provider you use not your personal info. So if it was AT&T or Verizon or AOL or whatever, they would then be the proud owner of the corporate address for those providers. They would then have to hack the provider to gain info on who used that IP at the same time as it was used here.

See where I am going with this? There is a long and nasty trail they would have to follow which is even more complex that the example above. How lucky do they feel and how eagerly do they wish to have that knock on their door from the FBI?

On top of this, the server logs don't even list who's IP did what. So there is no way to attach it to a forum username without actually getting into vBulletin's admin section. And I can assure you I know exactly who has ever had access to the vBulletin admin section. We're not stupid here.

I have a friend who has a cousin that once knew a girl that dated a fellow that worked at a dry cleaner owned by an associate of the owner of the grocery store where the waiter from the restaurant you last ate last week buys his groceries. So I know whether you like cro?tons on your salad. Muahahahahaha

Hope that helps.

[tawnyfrog]

Cyber-Stalking

codemonkey;301369 wrote:

So I know whether you like cro?tons on your salad. Muahahahahaha

Damn!!!!!!

Now I am scared ......