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A Web Site Mysteriously Knows Who I Am & Details About My Last Visit. Scary!
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<blockquote data-quote="MacInWin" data-source="post: 1835879" data-attributes="member: 396914"><p>Well, at one time I had a fairly high security clearance which required me to fill in forms that had a ton of personal information. And then the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) was hacked and all that information was stolen. Later, my daughter, who also has a high security clearance, had her data stolen in another breach of the government, the information she had provided about me as her father was stolen. All of this has appeared on the dark web. Fortunately, I'd already changed every password everywhere to block them, although I did get a couple of amusing emails from the bad guys that said, basically, "<<name>> we have your passwords. Here is just one <<password>>. Pay us now in Bitcoin or we will tell the police you have a stash of pornography." I don't have pornography, never been to that kind of site, ever, and the password was one I had already changed. So basically, it was phishing with my personal information. </p><p></p><p>My approach now is to have Lifelock at the highest level, including their insurance against theft of identity, long passwords and never use public wifi for any business. I have a secure VPN and change the end points fairly often. I have three monitoring services who keep track of what is going on in the dark web and report to me what they find. My credit cards report to me every transaction, even if the card is present, and block anything outside my immediate location using the card until I tell them it's ok. I do tell them whenever I'm planning travel so that they then allow my travel transactions but block things at home. I still feel at risk, but I think I've done what I could, given where I am. I can't "hide" from the internet, it's a reality of life, but I do try to avoid "volunteering" information to places like Google. Other search engines may not be as good, but I just don't go to Google, ever, and won't voluntarily use any Alphabet product. I'm kind of hoping for a "forget me" law so that I can tell Alphabet to erase everything they have, but I'm not holding my breath on that one. Too many $$$ from Alphabet in Washington to prevent that.</p><p></p><p>I don't take the steps you do to delete cache and history because it doesn't really matter. They get your information while you are online, so deleting what makes for convenience is really of little true value for security.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="MacInWin, post: 1835879, member: 396914"] Well, at one time I had a fairly high security clearance which required me to fill in forms that had a ton of personal information. And then the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) was hacked and all that information was stolen. Later, my daughter, who also has a high security clearance, had her data stolen in another breach of the government, the information she had provided about me as her father was stolen. All of this has appeared on the dark web. Fortunately, I'd already changed every password everywhere to block them, although I did get a couple of amusing emails from the bad guys that said, basically, "<<name>> we have your passwords. Here is just one <<password>>. Pay us now in Bitcoin or we will tell the police you have a stash of pornography." I don't have pornography, never been to that kind of site, ever, and the password was one I had already changed. So basically, it was phishing with my personal information. My approach now is to have Lifelock at the highest level, including their insurance against theft of identity, long passwords and never use public wifi for any business. I have a secure VPN and change the end points fairly often. I have three monitoring services who keep track of what is going on in the dark web and report to me what they find. My credit cards report to me every transaction, even if the card is present, and block anything outside my immediate location using the card until I tell them it's ok. I do tell them whenever I'm planning travel so that they then allow my travel transactions but block things at home. I still feel at risk, but I think I've done what I could, given where I am. I can't "hide" from the internet, it's a reality of life, but I do try to avoid "volunteering" information to places like Google. Other search engines may not be as good, but I just don't go to Google, ever, and won't voluntarily use any Alphabet product. I'm kind of hoping for a "forget me" law so that I can tell Alphabet to erase everything they have, but I'm not holding my breath on that one. Too many $$$ from Alphabet in Washington to prevent that. I don't take the steps you do to delete cache and history because it doesn't really matter. They get your information while you are online, so deleting what makes for convenience is really of little true value for security. [/QUOTE]
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A Web Site Mysteriously Knows Who I Am & Details About My Last Visit. Scary!
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