Jacksonville Jaguars Fan Forums

NEVER, EVER, EVER post yours or anyone else's personal email address on the forum.  This is especially true if the email address contains what is known as PII (Personal Identifying Information).  What I mean is that many email accounts use people's names or initials as part of the email address.  As an example, a user might have an email address that is [email protected].  If you post that on the forum, you just publicly told everyone that "first name" "last name" works at some company.  Even just divulging a person's name is critical.

 

Something that might be "meaningless" could be valuable to someone with malicious intent.

 

The thing is, this is a public message board that is scanned constantly.  If you scroll down you might see a "user logged on" name like "google", "bing", "yahoo" or something like that.  That user is not a person, it's a program that is running looking for data.  Some of the actual usernames could be the same thing and you would never know it.  What those programs do is go out and look for data and someone doing something malicious might be looking for patterns that resemble an email.

 

Many of those programs are collecting email addresses in order to send spam or worse, a virus to unsuspecting users.

 

In the case of the google, bing and yahoo instance, it's the search engines probably looking for keywords such as "quarterback", "coach", etc. to import into their databases.  In other instances it could be that somebody searched "Blake Bortles" and one of their link results lead them to this website.

 

The bottom line is, anything posted in the forums is open to the public and accessible by ANYONE whether they are registered users or not.  NEVER, EVER post anything that you want to keep private.

 

If you need to pass an email address, a phone number or any other PII to a mod, an admin or anyone else, always do it via a pm or by other means.

Would it be safe to post my SSN and bank account numbers?

Quote:Would it be safe to post my SSN and bank account numbers?

No...send those to me in a pm too.

Quote:Would it be safe to post my SSN and bank account numbers?

 

Absolutely.

This is kind of tied to a post made on one of the other sub-forums.  I suggested to the poster of the message that he/she remove the email address and it's since been removed.

 

Just for fun, I looked into it a bit and found out some interesting information based on just an email address.

 

I know the person's real name.

 

I know where the person works or has worked in the past.

 

I know what year the person graduated from high school.

 

I know what high school the person went to.

 

I know the high school mascot.

 

I know the names of some of the person's friends.

 

I know of the physical description of the person and even have a photo.

 

My point is, with something as simple as an email address posted to a public forum, somebody with malicious intent can gain a lot of valuable information very quickly.  If I really cared I'll bet that I can figure out where the person was born and what the person's mother's maiden name was/is.  Does any of this information sound familiar?

 

Of course I've since discarded the information because I have no use for it.  This was just a "test" for me to see if it was possible, and yes it's very possible for someone to gain very personal and private data on another person just from an email address.

Quote:This is kind of tied to a post made on one of the other sub-forums.  I suggested to the poster of the message that he/she remove the email address and it's since been removed.

 

Just for fun, I looked into it a bit and found out some interesting information based on just an email address.

 

I know the person's real name.

 

I know where the person works or has worked in the past.

 

I know what year the person graduated from high school.

 

I know what high school the person went to.

 

I know the high school mascot.

 

I know the names of some of the person's friends.

 

I know of the physical description of the person and even have a photo.

 

My point is, with something as simple as an email address posted to a public forum, somebody with malicious intent can gain a lot of valuable information very quickly.  If I really cared I'll bet that I can figure out where the person was born and what the person's mother's maiden name was/is.  Does any of this information sound familiar?

 

Of course I've since discarded the information because I have no use for it.  This was just a "test" for me to see if it was possible, and yes it's very possible for someone to gain very personal and private data on another person just from an email address.

 

This is why I always lie on those questions for security purposes.  

Creeper

Mine is [email protected].

Quote:No...send those to me in a pm too.

Beat me to it.

Quote:Mine is [email protected].

Since we're all being honest here, mine is [email protected]

Quote:Mine is [email protected].

Quote:Since we're all being honest here, mine is [email protected]

 

If you guys want to play a dangerous game, then post your real email address and when I get around to it, I'll post publicly what I find out.  Np bogus email account.  If you have the balls to do it, post your real email address.  I'll tell you in advance, that doing so is a very bad idea.  If you want me to test it privately, then send it to me via PM.  As my original post tries to teach people, anything shared on a public message board is just that... public.  I would discourage people from sharing their email address publicly.

After I started using the Internet almost 20 years ago, people were strongly advised not to use their real names online for security reasons. What happened to that advice? Now my mom wishes I would use my real name for my address since most people are doing that.

 

I am not sure if this belongs here, but this is a reason not to use my real name: it includes the letter L. Someone used an evil trick on me, replacing the lowercase L with a capital i. So if you have one of those two letters in your address you're really going to have problems here.

also don't pay bills online either. my dad does that,and its caused some headaches. its best to pay bills by going to the companey itself. if your going out somewere to buy something in a store its best to use cash. if you can't pay for it with cash then you shouldn't buy it.

Stalk much?

Quote:If you guys want to play a dangerous game, then post your real email address and when I get around to it, I'll post publicly what I find out. Np bogus email account. If you have the balls to do it, post your real email address. I'll tell you in advance, that doing so is a very bad idea. If you want me to test it privately, then send it to me via PM. As my original post tries to teach people, anything shared on a public message board is just that... public. I would discourage people from sharing their email address publicly.

So, you're the guy nobody talks to at parties, right?


And it's [email protected].


And don't forget my wife, [email protected].

Quote:So, you're the guy nobody talks to at parties, right?


And it's [email protected].


And don't forget my wife, [email protected].

My personal one is [email protected]

Mines [email protected]


Tell us what you find when you go looking for Amanda_Hugginkiss...

[email protected]

Quote:Mines [email protected]


Tell us what you find when you go looking for Amanda_Hugginkiss...

Usually a credit card bill with a non-descript name. 

Quote:Would it be safe to post my SSN and bank account numbers?

Could you also provide your mothers maiden name too, please?