Come on guys & girls...fill-in your details!

[bluedragon]

As a regular (but recent) particpant if the forum, I'm surprised by the number of other users that have little if any information in their profiles. It's helpful to know who's who, their background, other interests, type of boat, location, etc. I know there is a culture of anonymity online in general, but we're not some dodgy chatroom are we!! In the last few months I haven't got any hate mail, death threats, nasty phone calls or my identity stolen. I'd be happy if someone looks-up who I am and calls by the boat some time to say "hello"...so what's the problem?? Seriously...is there one?? I'd like to know if there is.

 

[Shanty]

My theory is that this forum is inhabited by a group of spotty teenaged nerds pretending to be yotties. Hence no profiles that might give them away.

Then, of course, there are others who are just very, very shy.

 

[BrendanS]

I've demonstrated several times, how given just a simple detail like a boat name, I can discover where the boat is kept, the owners home address, telephone number, his real name, his wifes name, his business dealings, company turnover etc etc

And it's remarkably easy to do. It depends how comfortable you are with this information being accessible I guess.

 

[knewboater]

Re: Come on guys & girls...fill-in your details!

Does what you say Brendan tell us not to fill in our details or what? I have mentioned this subject before on this forum but was told that most forumites are in fact sailors or interested in sailing,according to your research.

 

[BrendanS]

Re: Come on guys & girls...fill-in your details!

I don't think you have much to worry about from the people who post here. Many people off the forums meet quite regularly, and that's a totally separate discussion.


All I'm saying is be careful what you put in your profile. Anyone (not a poster or forumite) can trawl through the posts, and look for people who have announced they are off sailing with the family for the weekend, or going on holiday for 2 weeks. If someone with malicious intent then had the ability to find the home addresses of those people........

 

[bluedragon]

[ QUOTE ]
I've demonstrated several times, how given just a simple detail like a boat name, I can discover where the boat is kept, the owners home address, telephone number, his real name, his wifes name, his business dealings, company turnover etc etc

And it's remarkably easy to do. It depends how comfortable you are with this information being accessible I guess.

[/ QUOTE ]

The only thing you can't get from the BT phone directory is my boat name. I don't see how that gives a better starting point to currupt my life!

 

[BrendanS]

You can only look someone up in the phone directory, if you know roughly where they live, or have an unusual name, as a general rule.

If you want to provide all that info, then fair enough, but not everyone does.

 

[Ohdrat]

Boat name search on the ITU site gives owners name...

 

[Mike21]

At present anybody can view your profile, not just registered users.
Doing a websearch of your username will pull up your profile
Think if that info was only available to registered users then people might post a bit more info

 

[BrendanS]

I don't see why making profiles available to registered users only should make any difference. If someone wants that info, then they can register easily enough, with very little way of finding out who they are - it just needs a temporary email address

 

[VicMallows]

Agree.

Google me and you'll have me in seconds. As for my wife, you'll have to find out, but won't be difficult. Unfortunately you won't find out anything remotely interesting!

Now here is a challange which might change my mind on the issue if you solve it: What is our older daughters surname?

Vic

 

[BrendanS]

Do you think if I called your wife Rose nicely on one of your phones - (02xxx) 4xxx69 or (07xxx) 9xxx4 she might tell me?

Seriously though, it's perfectly doable, but would take a bit longer

 

[Forbsie]

Marsh? /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

 

[VicMallows]

She'd probably be more than happy to talk to you! The mobile is out of date though. Challenge still on!

Vic

 

[VicMallows]

No. He was my fathers best friend at school. /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif His other nickname was 'sticky'.

true, really,

Vic

 

[BrendanS]

It would be a long and reasonably costly process - basically involving looking for small clues and using online registry office queries - so I don't think I'll take up the challenge unless I get really, really bored /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif

Sorry, bit distracted by Wales France match at moment!!!

 

[Guest]

Re: Come on guys & girls...fill-in your details!

A little on the paranoid side I would say. There are much easier ways:

The boat name can be got by strolling past a harbour and reading it. Owners name not hard to ascertain. Fact of departure out to sea can be observed by standing on the harbour wall, looking which boats go out. I think that's much more likely (local thief) than someone searching endless posts for weeks on end, on the off chance the relevant info may come up and probably having to cross the country to take advantage of it...

 

[BrendanS]

Re: Come on guys & girls...fill-in your details!

Many of us live several hours away from boat, so local knowledge not of much use there. Anyway, it's up to you whether you want to put info on here about yourself, I and others prefer not to do so

 

[bluedragon]

Re: Come on guys & girls...fill-in your details!

Most of the discussion is around boat names. My original point was that many profiles are devoid of any info about the member. Keep anything off that bothers you, but that's no reason to leave all fields blank as some do.

 

[VicMallows]

Younger one easyer ... shows up well on the web ... then plain sailing /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif

Vic