Free write

Take fifteen minutes and find out everything you can about yourself by Googling your name. What would others learn about you?

Initially I Googled just my name. None of the results on the first few pages were anything related to myself. Then I Googled my name and state, which gave one result on the first page that was my own. What was alarming was this site contained not just information about me, but had alias names, cities I lived in and names of my close relatives. You had to pay for the full report, but that amount of information alone was enough to give someone the basics to answer security questions that most sites use for password recovery. In addition, it gives someone a starting point to begin a search of public records online to find further information about you. Once you know the area someone has lived in, you can look at public records for housing and tax information to find addresses for a person. With an address, a person can use Google maps (or any other similar service) to have a recent satellite image of their home and surrounding areas. Most states list their court information online in a public database. So having a name and area can help search those sites for all sorts of information. The state’s court site will list a partial birthday, which can be used in social engineering attacks. Some states list identifying information along with mug shots which will make searching online even easier.

I went one-step further and Googled my name, city and state that brought up the correct and direct links to my LinkedIn profile and SCORE local page where I volunteer. Fortunately, none of my other social media pages (Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram) were shown in the search results. This whole experience was an eye-opening one. I thought I had taken care to keep my information protected online. While this turned out to be true with social media outlets, it was very unsettling to find my personal information available anyway.