There was recently a child of 14 who posted about having sex with her boyfriend - she gave her name AND her City AND I "found" her in less than a minute. I have no evil intent but someone else - ? It made me question whether some info posted by people who are underage should be somehow edited.

My experience today - My late husband's ID has been used to open charge accounts three times in the past four years. Every time the credit card company has given me a hard time - "How did anyone get his Social Security number?" I've always blamed hospital or ambulance personnel, believing that someone got his info out of his wallet (although I don't believe he carried his SS card). On a fifth occasion this WAS the case, and I was able to prove it, partly because the (stupid) EMT was wearing my husband's engraved watch the next time the ambulance was called to our home.

My argument to the credit card companies has always been, "He's deceased. Trust me, he is definitely not opening charge accounts."

Today I'm searching for someone as part of a job assignment, and I came across a site called ancientfaces. Just to see what's posted there I typed in my late husband's name. Up came his full name, date of birth, date of death - and his SS number in this manner 123-XX-4567. Our home address is listed, and I'm listed as his widow. Anyone interested in scoping out women who live alone has just been handed the keys to the kingdom.

Obviously the site is somewhat out of date, but...

How many combinations of those two "missing" numbers can there be? No wonder people are stealing each other's identity!

There is absolutely nothing to be done about the information posted on the Internet, but it is sobering.

At any rate - sobering stuff.

This is part editing question and part rant.

If you do death checks on social security death index, it gives you where they lived at death and their social security numbers, easy to find info on most dead people.

But yes, I have found livings peoples social security number in searches, have even found my cousins credit card number that was not properly protected by one book sales company.

One would be astounded at the ease with which information can be gleaned about people online... to say nothing of the extra effort one could put into it using real world techniques.

Even creepier is the realization that you may not even realize they are watching. Or who they are.

Obituaries list a woman's maiden name plus her surviving offspring. Her maiden name that can be the answer to her offsprings' security question.

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Originally Posted by Wondergirl

Obituaries list a woman's maiden name plus her surviving offspring. Her maiden name that can be the answer to her offsprings' security question.

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I just read in one of my professional magazines that maiden names - yours, your mother's - are the most often used security passwords.

What is privacy really? The internet has too much information when it comes to personal information and sites like Google are ramping up to take any privacy you thought you had and take it away for distribution.