It seems like we go through a round of this every couple of years. First it was Google Plus, then it was Quora, it's been Facebook for a while, and now OKCupid

It seems like we go through a round of this every couple of years. First it was Google Plus, then it was Quora, it's been Facebook for a while, and now OKCupid has thrown themselves into the idiocy ring. I've already written and spoken at length about how misguided, stupid, and harmful these policies are. So has the EFF. For years. There really is no excuse for a company to even consider adopting one of these now, assuming they adopt policies based on evidence and reason, which seems increasingly unlikely. This one is particularly egregious because of all the abuse it opens people up to, especially women. If you have a photo and a legal first name, all someone has to do is match the photo against Facebook or flickr, match your first name, get a last name, and the address comes along shortly after that. Because of the nature of okcupid, I could actually see someone sending a woman a few messages, taking it personally that she doesn't respond, looking her up, finding her physical address, and then she shows up as a news tragedy. If OKCupid moves forward with this, there might actually be blood on their hands in the future.