Are you voluntarily giving away your privacy when you make youtube comments?

[Beamin]

DISCLAIMER: I HAVE NO DESIRE TO START A DEBATE ABOUT THE ETHICS OR POLITICS INVOLVED WITH THIS. I'M TRYING TO KEEP THIS THREAD TECHNICAL AND WITHIN THE FORUMS TECH SUBJECT MATTER!!!

People on this forum seem to know a lot about this stuff, certainly more then I, and I consider myself well versed in the subject matter.
We live in an age with no privacy and companies like target guessing you are pregnant and Netflix calling you gay, banks collecting a consumer report on you and companies checking to see if a new hire is a potential alcoholic based on the banks records showing you make a $5.00 purchase at a liquor store everyday. I personally don't like any company to know anything about me.


What about Google and it's companies like gmail and youtube? If you make a lot of comments or likes on youtube does google tie this info into your real name? Say you have a google red account that you pay for with your credit card? There was a law passed where ISP could read your email and collect any info that was previously protected like health records/info and your social security number. While it's impossible to be totally anonymous what are some simple steps you can take to make it harder? I'm worried about my online habbits or opinions crossing over into the real world. In the 2000's I worked for comcast and I became friends with an instructor there who also did hiring. The amount of things they look into even before you get the job and even after, was disturbing. This wasn't some entry level customer service position but a job where just training you is going to cost them well over $10k, so they are making sure you are profitable.  Before you get the job they looked at our credit report, our consumer report the bank generates when you use your debit card (I'm guessing the only way to mitigate this is always pay cash, and opt out when you sign up for an account in 30 days BUT the bank makes it very clear this only limits some data and it is legal what they are doing. Companies only tell you this if it is really important), and anything that you put up online such as face book or typing your name into google.  They also pay to see the extra info:  intellius(sp) and axiom. I'm sure bynow there aredozens of companies since they have GPS and access to your texts, pic messages, and other smartphone data you gave away because you wanted a free game of candy crush. Yes you could have lost out on a really good job because you downloaded a free app.  Totally subjectively if you had pictures of you drinking or doing something questionable or illegal you wouldn't even know if you were going to be hired and they saw one thing online that didn't match "corporate values" and then they just didn't call back or say they weren't hiring. If you passed all this and the interview you got the job. But even during training it as an at will contract and they would video tape us and do psychological analysis by watching the videos. The instructor told me about my learning styles and it was really disturbing they knew this stuff. I also found it interesting that certain jobs they like to hire gay people, like customer service but not in sales, unless you were a gay women. Totally illegal but there is no way to prove they are doing this. This last fact I learned while lying in my instructors bed so I consider it true.


I am unfortunate in that my name is very unique and when you google it you get me or the fake aliases I have made up over the years just so you are not 100% sure it's me. This is a huge concern for me because I don't want anyone to know I am trans. There is a special way I have to change my name that includes paying extra money not to have this fact directly revealed. I even considered changing my last name but I like my heritage and it's shitty to have to do that because you have no privacy.


So what are your experiences and how do you handle this? I'm thinking of writing a guide to follow where you can minimize this or fix mistakes that could cost you a very good job. The worst part is you could have some incorrect data on you or have the same name as a someone else and their past history is costing you jobs and opportunities. Its quite scary to think that if we start to get a hostile government they could usealgrhythms   to find "enemies of the state" like china's social credit score. 2+2=5. Because of 2008 and it messing up my credit score, all my past jobs in the financial sector I can no longer have and all those licenses, training, and past references are worthless because I chose to remodel and sell my house right before the crash.

[mmagin]

If you make a lot of comments or likes on youtube does google tie this info into your real name?

If they have your real name on the account (or a transaction associated with the account), of course they do.  These companies collect the maximum amount of information on you that they can by law.  Now, the real question is: do you care if your youtube comments are associated with your real name and/or do you trust Google to not disclose this to third parties?

[ataradov]

I handle this easy - I don't do online things I would not do in real life. So my online presence is a good indication of who I am in real life.

I used to hide my real name behind aliases long time ago because of the outlined concerns. But then I realized that I don't do anything "bad" online, and there is actually more value in me being public and putting my name out there. That's how I got my present job - I've got a job offer because I was helping people on the forum better and more efficiently than company's own support people.

[bsudbrink]

Exactly.  When I was introduced to the net (back when it was the Arpanet) I seem to recall that the USENET intro/help file contained the advice: Do not post anything on USENET that you would be embarrassed to see on the front page of the New York Times.  I have followed that "rule" for everything that I have posted on any electronic public forum.

[james_s]

I handle this easy - I don't do online things I would not do in real life. So my online presence is a good indication of who I am in real life.

I used to hide my real name behind aliases long time ago because of the outlined concerns. But then I realized that I don't do anything "bad" online, and there is actually more value in me being public and putting my name out there. That's how I got my present job - I've got a job offer because I was helping people on the forum better and more efficiently than company's own support people.

I generally don't do anything bad, but the problem is what is "bad" is highly subjective and constantly changing. Saying something that was perfectly reasonable and wouldn't turn any heads 20 or even 10 years ago can now get people fired/harassed endlessly regardless of whether what they said then still reflects their views now. In today's hyper-sensitive world you have to walk on eggshells to avoid upsetting somebody somewhere no matter what you say. Things you saw online are preserved indefinitely for the world to see.

[ataradov]

Things you saw online are preserved indefinitely for the world to see.

  This is a concern, of course. But I also try to avoid politics and such, so hopefully it all works out. Because the alternative is being paranoid and hiding all the time ultimately with the same or similar end result.

[james_s]

This is a concern, of course. But I also try to avoid politics and such, so hopefully it all works out. Because the alternative is being paranoid and hiding all the time ultimately with the same or similar end result.

I try, but it is not always easy. In the end what I mostly do is try not to be the low-hanging fruit. I don't go out of my way to conceal my identity but I don't openly share it either. If somebody really wanted to figure out who I am outside of a given forum it wouldn't be *that* hard to do but hopefully combined with my efforts to not say anything too terribly controversial will be enough to avoid consequences down the road.

I do think it's a worrisome trend though. People do evolve over time and their views and opinions change. If someone did/said/supported something in the past that today is considered unacceptable, I generally don't think they should be punished for it. A sort of statute of limitations if you will on that sort of thing. Of course merely suggesting this is the sort of thing some busybody could use to infer all kinds of stuff about me that may or may not be true.

[rdl]

Don't use any online service that requires your real name, address, phone number, etc., unless it offers you enormous benefits. And even then, review their privacy policy carefully. Keep in mind that needing to disclose no more than an email address only provides you with a weak second line of defense.

As others have said, always act online just as you would in any public place. The truth will come out if someone wants to go digging for it.

[Beamin]

If you make a lot of comments or likes on youtube does google tie this info into your real name?

If they have your real name on the account (or a transaction associated with the account), of course they do.  These companies collect the maximum amount of information on you that they can by law.  Now, the real question is: do you care if your youtube comments are associated with your real name and/or do you trust Google to not disclose this to third parties?

Yes.
No.

I should never have signed up to watch the vsauce/mindfield videos. Is there any way to fix that? Googles term are beyond vague they don't even say "sometime we might share some information with our affiliates for billing and marketing purposes" that every other company does.


I once opened a gmail account and three hourslater got an email saying I violated their terms of service and the accout would be closed. I emailed them back and they said it part 37 which read "your account ill be closed if it violates the terms of service" Then the account as never closed.


I also want to know how they figure out which Gmail accounts are linked together. IP address? Some though I can't open while other Gmail accounts are open. It seems like google arbitrarily link some of my accounts while treating others differently.


Before all this I was using Gmail to contact doctors and my pharmacist. And of course like most people I keep a copy of my resume in Gmail in the sent items but not the drive account. 

[Mr. Scram]

That's the beauty and the problem of modern algorithms. Those have the ability to tie information together that a human would never have related. Google is very good at designing advanced algorithms that tease ever more information from what's seemingly noise.

Another example would be that we're now discovering that data that had been anonymized for research purposes could actually be traced back to actual people. We're doing things with datasets we didn't know were possible and it regularly means that measures taken to ensure anonimity aren't in hindsight enough.