Gather Friends Please Beware

thank you so much for reminding us of all that........so many scams everywhere and it is only going to get worse.......

It is so sad that people like that are out there.

**sigh** :(
Thanks for the head's up on this ...

Thanks, Kimberly.

because in some sad warped way these kind of ppl are proud of themselves and proud of the fact that they can scam someone. they already think they are smarter than everyone else. At least that's what I think from the ppl I've ever seen that lie and cheat others.

Thank yu for sharing this information. Making is aware is always a plus.

Thanks for the information!

Thanks for the great, informative article! It's really sad that people have to stoop so low to scam others.....but, I'm sure it's going to continue and will get even worse as time goes on.

Thanks for the info =)

I agree, it's so hard and I hate to be suspicious of every little thing.

Thank you for sharing.

I got rid of my birthdate. Thanks.

Thank you for posting to VRC

glitter-graphics.com

Thanks

Thanks

thx

Thanks!

people are horrible

Good advice Kimberly! It is amazing the amount of information that some members share about themselves...most of them probably without realizing it.

If you don't mind, I would like to post a "Featured Question" below that I published a few months ago that is very applicable to your article...

"A member on Gather acquired my address somehow and left several notes on my door at home wanting to meet me. How is this possible? Did Gather give out my address to someone????"

Gather's Privacy Policy prohibits them from releasing any personally identifiable information about you to other members. This would include your address.

However, it is fairly easy to determine the person responsible for releasing your address to other members. That person is likely to be...you, although you may not realize it.

Each time you publish content, update your profile, or comment in the community you can potentially reveal information about yourself and your family. This information may be relatively insignificant and meaningless on its own, but collectively can lead to a serious compromise of your privacy and personal safety.

To illustrate, although you do not use your real name on Gather or share photos of your children, I was able to acquire both within less than 20 minutes following a brief review of your content. In addition to these items, I was able to obtain your:

• Address
  
• Phone number
  
• Place of employment
  
• Work phone number
  
• Supervisor's name and phone number
  
• Job title
  
• Mother's maiden name
  
• Children's names
  
• Bank name and location

Plus, the name and address of the school your children attend, the location of the park your children often visit, the name of your best friend, your family names, photos of your house and where you do your shopping, among other personal information which could potentially be used by someone with ill intent towards you or your family.

While you did not directly share the majority of the information above, using simple searches on the internet allows a greater amount of data to be identified which can then be used to extract more information, via the internet or by telephone.

As an example, you recently shared a photo of a tree on your street struck by lightning. In this photo you could clearly identify street signs on the corner. In other photos, vehicle license plates identified your state. This alone was enough to pinpoint the location of your home. Additional 'summerpics' photos of your garden and backyard made identification and confirmation easier, although unnecessary. Even photos taken from inside your home could have been used to identify your house from the outside (objects outside of windows, style and placement of windows, etc.).

Once your real name was determined, it was then a simple process to locate your children's school and obtain photos of them, even though you have never shared these on Gather. Other information was obtained in a similar manner using your posts and profile.

Hence you have made it far too easy for others to locate information about you, even through the sharing of the most innocuous content or other postings.

To protect yourself and your family, I recommend:

• Never geotag photos unless the location is public and located very far from your home or workplace.
  
  
• Do not share photos that contain local landmarks or signs (streets, businesses, churches, etc.).
  
  
• Avoid using your real name, or the real name of your children, school or place of employment.
  
  
• Use care when sharing certain information within your profile. Even the name of your former school or hometown can be used by others in a negative way.
  
  
• Do not promote or mention other sites you have involvement with, unless you have taken precautions to remove personally identifiable information from those sites (Etsy, eBay, etc.).
  
  
• Never share your email address publicly.

Thanks for sharing that, Kevin! It's terrible that we have to be so careful! I've made some wonderful friends here but I'm always careful to PM them my private email address. I've only shared it with a couple of people here who work with me on my book but it can be really dangerous!

Scammers can get you anywhere. You can be very cautious and they can still get your info. The only way to be sure is don't use a computer at all. I have read Kevin's article before and it did alert me to things that I have done in the past. We must all be careful.

Thanks for sharing with Do you have a Point?

You are so right. Thanks for the reminder.

Unfortunately, i have to put all my info out there, to get sales for my book!

It is sad that it has come to this...
Thank you for thinking of us.
~ Point Fairies

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Thank you for this warning. I really never thought about putting some of these things on here, but I guess any site can be vulnerable to such things. I went in and change a few things right away.

Thank you for the info

This is just a friendly comment to tell you that your content has reached 50 views and will now be removed from 50 Views Per Content Congrats.

I know lots here on gather blot out faces in photos and such... I know one that doesn't allow human photos in their groups for protection purposes. Someone will probably get me one day, I share a LOT of my life.

Just letting you know your content has reached 25 comments and has therefore been removed from ~3,000 Here We Come!~