A Web Site Mysteriously Knows Who I Am & Details About My Last Visit. Scary!

[MacInWin]

Charlie, Lifelock has reported that some of my information is in the Dark Web. Don't know if it was from OPM or the other breach, the one that got my daughter's application (that included our family information, of course).

 

[chscag]

I hear you. When OPM notified me of the breach, like you I decided not to take the warning lightly.

 

[Lifeisabeach]

At the end of the session I did my usual practice in Safari: A) Close All Tabs Except One B) Send that page to my home page, which is "About:Blank" C) Clicked "History" and chose "Clear History". D) Clicked "Develop" and "Empty Cache". E) Closed Safari. If I have been at private sites, such as banking, I'll also open Terminal and type "dscacheutil -flushcache". I did the above steps, without Flushcache after the session when I visited Humana.

Yikes!! ...
Days later, I went back to Humana and it said "Welcome Paul. Here are your last viewed plans" (or words to that effect). I was surprised and shocked that they knew me and the stuff I looked at last time.
(It picked my zip code as the one where the ISP's dish farm is located the first time I visited, but I'd imagine it got that from figuring out where the ip address is entering the internet. Lots of sites seem to do that part.)

I'm absolutely positive that I cleared history & cache after the first visit. That habit is in my DNA.
I also know that I did flushcache later that day, after moving around (lots of) money to the checking account so I could pay for health insurance. (An American tradition!) The computer had been restarted several times between Humana visits.

You could make this habit of yours a whole lot easier and more foolproof using Cookie, an app that manages cookies, browser cache, and more. You can set it to automatically toss cookies, cache, and/or history either every x minutes; on browser quit; on login; etc. You can have the behavior work differently across different browsers and whitelist sites that you may want to keep logged in. I cannot recommend this app highly enough for privacy-minded folks.. it's indispensable. They have a free trial and if you pull the trigger, I recommend buying direct from the developer, not the App Store, just because a lot of apps off the Store can be hobbled thanks to Apple's restrictions.

Cookie by SweetP Productions

BTW, if you aren't using an adblocker, you absolutely should be doing that also as another layer of protection.

 

[PGB1]

Paul, while HIPPA is an attempt at privacy, if the doctor is in a practice that is associated with a medical vendor who provides coverage for Medicare patients, the data gets shared. And, I suppose there may be a few medical office & billing clerks who aren't all that honest about keeping data private. That's a good reason to leave the Social Security number part of the medical office form blank.

What CR00zng mentioned about the public records reminded me, if I remember correctly, in Michigan one can pay $5.00 to Secretary of State office & get the information of who owns a particular license plate.

You could make this habit of yours a whole lot easier and more foolproof using Cookie...,

Thanks Lifeisabeach! That application sounds helpful to also accomplish one thing I can not figure out- keep one cookie. (Specifically DuckDuckGo preferences.)

BTW, if you aren't using an adblocker, you absolutely should be doing that also as another layer of protection. Thanks for the reminder!

One security item that my wife mentioned to me is a very good plan for people with a US Social Security number: Register for your on-line Social Security account even if you have no intention to interact with them for many years. Include your children. This is intended to help to prevent someone from hijacking your account. I doubt it is 100% effective, but certainly can't hurt. I checked into how it's done. The process is fast. There is a extra step if your credit is frozen. One must un-freeze and re-freeze when done with Social Security registration. There is a link to the appropriate page in the Social Security registration page.

 

[MacInWin]

And, I suppose there may be a few medical office & billing clerks who aren't all that honest about keeping data private. That's a good reason to leave the Social Security number part of the medical office form blank.

Medicare, for those who are on it, for a long time used the SSN as the Medicare number. That then gave the medical providers your SSN with no ability to keep it out of their hands. Now they issue special numbers to replace the SSN, but the horse is long out of the barn.

 

[chscag]

Now they issue special numbers to replace the SSN, but the horse is long out of the barn.

And for those of us who are officially retired from US military service our retired military ID cards likewise contain the SSAN. Supposedly new ID cards issued do not have the SSAN, however, a new card will not be issued to the current holder just to remove the SSAN.

Just another horse Jake that has long left the barn!