this post was submitted on 25 Oct 2024
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Asklemmy

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[โ€“] TheOubliette@lemmy.ml 7 points 4 weeks ago (3 children)

I would recommend that anyone concerned with privacy either use a burner account or not answer these kinds of questions.

While statistically I'm sure there are many straight men here, doxxing and other forms of identification are enabled by combining different breadcrumbs of information.

[โ€“] return2ozma@lemmy.world 10 points 4 weeks ago (1 children)
[โ€“] TheOubliette@lemmy.ml 7 points 4 weeks ago (2 children)

Your question is for "straight males", so those answering it are implicitly saying, " I am a straight male".

This is a subset of the population, so if you wanted to identify a user here, this would be a ckue. It would be useless on its own, but I'd they share more clues over time, they may reveal themselves accidentally to someone trying to fix them. Examples:

  • The city or state they live in.

  • Their age range.

  • Their ethnic identity.

Just that much info, which people will easily expose if they answer questions like this, could be enough to identify someone. There are only so many straight 23 year old dudes from Guam living in a particular suburb of Baltimore.

[โ€“] joshcodes@programming.dev 6 points 4 weeks ago (1 children)

This advice feels a lot like something that should be stuck on a wall rather than posted as a comment in a conversational subreddit. It's kind of like reminding people on posts about alcohol and partying not to drink and drive - unprompted. Reminders like this are great, but setting and context are important, otherwise you drive people away from the conversation.

[โ€“] TheOubliette@lemmy.ml 3 points 4 weeks ago

Comments with warning likes mine should be stickied at the top of all posts premised on people providing personal information in order to post.

[โ€“] eatthecake@lemmy.world 2 points 3 weeks ago

The Oubliette reminds you that the web does not forget..

[โ€“] Zahille7@lemmy.world 4 points 4 weeks ago (2 children)

Sssssuuuuuuurrrrre....

But I really don't think Lemmy is big or widespread enough for people to recognize each other based on random info and a username.

[โ€“] TheOubliette@lemmy.ml 4 points 4 weeks ago

Doxxing generally happens because someone wants to identify you, not because random people accidentally figure out who you are. A doxxer will attempt to extract details from your account's comment history and see if you have other accounts based on username or specific references.

[โ€“] Marin_Rider@aussie.zone 2 points 3 weeks ago

the proportion of terminally online losers who would actually waste their time doing it seem to be higher here than other places though

[โ€“] bamboo@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 points 3 weeks ago

I was told that i'm gay because my SSN ends with 1369. Ohh and also was told i'm gay because my mother's maiden name is Gaylord. Where do people come up with these rules???