The Security Mentor

There's an eye-opening Forbes article about the kind of information someone can find about you on the web. There's more to it than just Googling you. Have you ever put your real name and address into a "survey" or "sweepstakes"? Have you ever used an "adult verification" service to get into adult-only material?

If so then all your information has been carefully compiled into lists and put onto a fast-moving market for personal information. A site like responderinfo.com lets a marketer or a private detective look up the names of people in a particular zip code who are into alcohol, smoking, or "adult entertainment".

You could try clicking those tiny check boxes to opt out of marketing pitches, and hope that doing so deters web sites from selling your name. It's better to minimize how much personal information you ever release in the first place.