Publication of Personal Information

[35Remington]

EDIT: To put this thread in context, imagine you transact business on a rifle scope with someone on Craigslist who ends up being a shady character. After meeting in a public place, all they know about you is what you look like, what your phone number is, and that you like rifle scopes.

I'm sure many of you know much more than me about privacy and personal information. Please check any know-it-all attitudes at the door.

Last week, for reasons I can't remember, I googled my cell phone number. I was amazed when the very first results included my full name and home address, made public by the City of San Antonio when I added a new thermostat to my home. They publicized my information again when I applied for a permit to have a garage sale.

I am shocked (although only slightly in this day and age). I am the kind of person who reads the fine print before I sign on the dotted line, and at no point did I see language about public release of my information.

My emails to the city have gone unanswered at this point. I want this information taken down. Any suggestions?

Try googling your phone number and see what comes up. I included hyphens between the numbers (210-###-####).

 

[benenglish]

Off-topic comment - You're supposed to apply to the city for a permit to have a garage sale? Just...wow.

On-topic - I did the google search you suggested for all three of my phone numbers. My home landline phone turned up my full name and address from multiple sources in 5 or 6 of the first 7 or 8 links. I've had it for almost 30 years, long before I was cognizant of privacy issues. It's been listed in many phone books and put in so many databases that I'm not at all surprised to find my info out there.

There's a reason I never answer that phone any more. I just check the machine for messages.

OTOH, there are two cell phones in my house. For both those numbers (which were obtained after we all started taking privacy more seriously) there was no personally identifiable information available in the first dozen google hits. I feel sure someone who really wanted to find me and had only my cell number could do so but my casual risk is pretty minimized.

As to your situation, it's probably against the law in some cases but I've been known to make up numbers that I enter on official forms.

Also, applying for permits and such may create statutorily open records for which you have no recourse. Mayhaps there's a lawyer in the house who could address that.

 

[Glockster69]

I've had a similar issue through the State with my work license, they displayed personal address instead of my employer's. I had to call the licensing department, sometimes more than once, to get it changed. Good luck.

 

[Mexican_Hippie]

Name and address are public on the property tax records online. You can ping the city to ask they pull info on that specific site, but that cat has been out do the bag for a while.

Most of your basic info is already out there and probably sitting in a commercial data aggregation center available for purchase.

It sucks and I don't like it either, but the reality is that all of our basic info is already essentially public.

 

[Brains]

Seems nothing is private anymore. I guarantee starting with just my screen name and some search time, anyone here could find out a WHOLE lot about me, and be at my front door in time for dinner. Pretty friggin' scary when you think about it.

 

[London]

Your info is out there and there is realistically nothing you can do about it but start over with new phone, address, etc using the techniques outlined in the book One Nation Under Surveillance.

 

[Southpaw]

I did it too. Lots of old addresses with additional details available for a fee. One site connected my name and current PO Box with my one of my phone numbers. It was in a WHOIS query from an expired domain name, but nothing with my actual address, which is more of a concern to me, hence the PO Box. But, I am sure for a few dollars, anything can be found out.

I use my landline number for any and all entities that request or require a number and then regularly check the caller ID. I don't even have a phone connected to it truth be told.

Was the site your details where on operated by SA?

 

[SIG_Fiend]

A quick tip that can also help in identifying these things. If you use quotation marks when searching Google, Bing, or Yahoo, it's what's typically called "exact match search". Basically, it will only find records in their search indexes of the exact query within the quotation marks. That can help narrow down the results to only what's relevant. So, for example, I might do several individual searches like this to find different variations of my info:

"210-xxx-xxxx"
"(210)-xxx-xxxx"
"210xxxxxxx"

Get creative and try to think of variations you might find. Sometimes the results you come up with are pretty interesting.

 

[Southpaw]

^^^forgot about that!!!!

 

[35Remington]

I understand that a person with enough time and resources can likely dig up anyone's personal info. That is not the point I wish to discuss in this thread.

What shocked me was the fact that if I call someone, they can immediately find out who I am and where I sleep, thanks to the City of San Antonio. To be clear, the ONLY HIT on Google that included my name and address was the City of San Antonio website.

This is the website: http://www.sanantonio.gov/dsd/pdf/BlgPermGrantedWeekEnding2014-03-08-19-16-34.pdf

 

[35Remington]

I have now remembered the reason I googled my number. Craigslist.

The following edit has been added to post #1: To put this thread in context, imagine you transact business on a rifle scope with someone on Craigslist who ends up being a shady character. After meeting in a public place, all they know about you is what you look like, what your phone number is, and that you like rifle scopes.

Even though we met in public, that guy now knows who I am, and where I live, thanks to CoSA.

 

[Acera]

Would you like a list of your past traffic tickets???

I met a guy that uses this and said it is amazing what records it pulls up.

People Search | Find People Online - Instant Checkmate

(If one of you signs up, let me know I might ask you to run a name or two for me )

 

[shortround]

San Antonio and Bexar County, generally, are governed (ruled) by far left wing ideologues. They want to control every aspect of your life. Since they control over 50 percent of the vote that depends on government hand outs, they refuse to recognize the productive minority in our community.

I once thought about moving away. Not anymore. Now, it is a fight that I will fight until my dying day.

California got fucked up because not enough people stood up to the fascist leftists. It started in San Francisco, then spread to LA and on to Sacramento.

I'll ride the damned bus and go to the Alamo armed. I'll put brush in my trash bin. I'll put plastic bags loose in my recycle bin. I'll pour used motor oil on my fence line to kill weeds. I'll water my yard whenever I damned well want to. I won't neuter my intact male Labrador, and I sure as hell won't pay for a breeder's license, nor will I pay for an ordinary pet license.

I call or e-mail the mayor and my councilman every time I get stuck in traffic, hit a pot hole, or run into traffic lights that are not synchronized.

I will harvest part of the over-populated deer herds that overwhelm my neighborhood, and I shop in neighboring counties to starve Bexar County and San Antonio of my share of their sales taxes.

Even State Government is so bloated, they forgot I have a septic system, and have not told me to pump the septic tank in over five years. Damn, I know when the tank needs to be pumped! Not at some arbitrary five-year interval some schmuck at dot.state thinks is required.

Just do your little bit of civil disobedience. There ain't enough cops to bust us all if we overwhelm them with minor acts of resistance.

 

[SIG_Fiend]

Well, there are always things a person can do to try and protect their identity and privacy as much as possible. It may not be perfect, but there are options. For example, for using a phone number in online ads, use a disposable cell. Also, only ever use one name, and not your full name. Also, use a totally separate email account. Heck, if you wanted to, you could create a separate email for every single ad you put up on various sites, so there would never be any search index of the email address.

As it is in Texas, county appraisal district tax assessment details are public record and freely available on most county websites. It's been many years since I was in the appraisal business but, IIRC, I believe there are a few counties that have ordinances protecting tax assessment info so that it is not publicly listed. Or at least at some point there were. That being said, with the vast majority of Texan counties, the information is publicly available. Anyways, if someone knows what they're doing, it is ridiculously easy to locate property owned by a person (if it's "real property"), if you know just a few pieces of information about them.

I like your defiant attitude, shortround.

 

[txinvestigator]

I understand that a person with enough time and resources can likely dig up anyone's personal info. That is not the point I wish to discuss in this thread.

What shocked me was the fact that if I call someone, they can immediately find out who I am and where I sleep, thanks to the City of San Antonio. To be clear, the ONLY HIT on Google that included my name and address was the City of San Antonio website.

This is the website: http://www.sanantonio.gov/dsd/pdf/BlgPermGrantedWeekEnding2014-03-08-19-16-34.pdf

City records are public information.

 

[Jakashh]

holy shit my number pops up just about 4 guns that i've sold in the past.

 

[vmax]

Permit required to put in a thermostat?! un freaking believable. I would never submit to that. Just put the darn thing in

 

[SA_Steve]

I've got a friend who thinks he lives off grid at the end of a county road 50 miles from anywhere in central TX. He is very stealth, holding his property in an LLC, picking his mail up once a week away from home, but I found him (with phone number and physical address) on the internet in the TX State database of water well permits.

 

[txinvestigator]

I've got a friend who thinks he lives off grid at the end of a county road 50 miles from anywhere in central TX. He is very stealth, holding his property in an LLC, picking his mail up once a week away from home, but I found him (with phone number and physical address) on the internet in the TX State database of water well permits.

And he is named in the LLC and a simple search of the Texas Secretary of State website will find him. lol

 

[mortdooley]

I always check robo calls on google rather then answer unfamiliar numbers. There is no privacy anymore especially online.