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I'm Gen Z too and for my whole life the advice has been "Don't put your real info on the internet". The only thing that comes up when you search my name is my g

I'm Gen Z too and for my whole life the advice has been "Don't put your real info on the internet". The only thing that comes up when you search my name is my gitlab profile and a technical blog. All of my cringy forum posts still exist but they are all under random usernames and would be very difficult to link back to me.

LargoLasskhyfv 6y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stylometry https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stylometry
- Polylactic_acid 6y ago
  Yes I'm quite aware that if governments were after me they could probably dig up this stuff but thats not my concern. I'm focused on random internet users being able to dig up 10 year old posts which would be insanely difficult given how much crap there is on the internet and how much I have changed since then.
  - LargoLasskhyfv 6y ago
    I remember reading corporations crawling the so called "deep web" and even the "dark nets", advertising their capabilities as superior for gathering new insights/intelligence a few years ago. Was just a short blip on my radar, because I haven't seen it mentioned afterwards. Anyways, what can be done probabably will be done, for whichever reason because it's getting cheaper and cheaper. And then the next leak happens. And somewhere on some site like Have I been owned?, or in a torrent there is a comma separated list with many, or even all of your former pseudonyms connected with your current address, social security, drivers license, younameit. Gotcha!
    - Godel_unicode 6y ago
      Who does this kind of wild speculation help?
      - nitrogen 6y ago
        It's not speculation, it's basically an open source intelligence tool. I can't recall the name of the company I somehow stumbled upon, but they exist. Palantir, as an example, might be someone who you'd expect to develop commercial tools for intelligence gathering. High frequency traders or other investors also.
        Godel_unicode 6y ago
        It is speculation. They do not exist. You're thinking of Maltego, and it's very far from what is being described. Palantir makes software, not a panopticon for their own use. High frequency trading is entirely unrelated to scrounging the deep dark web for crumbs to stitch together forum accounts. This is a fantasy spurred on by too many dark mirror episodes, nobody does stuff like that for the hell of it. Storing the amount of data we're talking about is expensive. Collecting it is expensive. Processing it is expensive. There's little money to be made with it, but it sounds really good if you don't think too hard about it. It's illuminati conspiracy mumbo jumbo for nerds.
        LargoLasskhyfv 6y ago
        Chill...
    - nl 6y ago
      This really isn't how this works. Stylometry is a thing, sure. But it's rarely accurate enough to use on bulk archives in an automated way, especially when archives come from different domains (eg, technical vs social writing). It's useful for identifying possible alternate authors plays attributed to Shakespeare[1], but a lot less useful for trying to tie a reddit identity to a github profile. Anyways, what can be done probabably will be done, for whichever reason because it's getting cheaper and cheaper. Crawling and storing is cheap, but analysis is harder. Automated spell checking ("probabably" above not withstanding!) and auto-complete means stylometry is even less useful now. Source: myself - I work in natural language processing, and have talked to people applying these techniques. [1] https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.00289/full https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.0028...
      - LargoLasskhyfv 6y ago
        Consider the spelling "chaff" for Rokos Basilisk :)
- dumpsterdiver 6y ago
  For any who are interested in witnessing a fictionalized example of applied Stylometry, I highly suggest the Star Wars Thrawn series by Timothy Zahn. Thrawn's specialty is making tactical inferences based on the physical art pieces created by a culture. It's a really interesting read, but don't take my word for it!
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]

LargoLasskhyfv 6y ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stylometry https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stylometry

Polylactic_acid 6y ago
Yes I'm quite aware that if governments were after me they could probably dig up this stuff but thats not my concern. I'm focused on random internet users being able to dig up 10 year old posts which would be insanely difficult given how much crap there is on the internet and how much I have changed since then.
- LargoLasskhyfv 6y ago
  I remember reading corporations crawling the so called "deep web" and even the "dark nets", advertising their capabilities as superior for gathering new insights/intelligence a few years ago. Was just a short blip on my radar, because I haven't seen it mentioned afterwards. Anyways, what can be done probabably will be done, for whichever reason because it's getting cheaper and cheaper. And then the next leak happens. And somewhere on some site like Have I been owned?, or in a torrent there is a comma separated list with many, or even all of your former pseudonyms connected with your current address, social security, drivers license, younameit. Gotcha!
  - Godel_unicode 6y ago
    Who does this kind of wild speculation help?
    - nitrogen 6y ago
      It's not speculation, it's basically an open source intelligence tool. I can't recall the name of the company I somehow stumbled upon, but they exist. Palantir, as an example, might be someone who you'd expect to develop commercial tools for intelligence gathering. High frequency traders or other investors also.
      - Godel_unicode 6y ago
        It is speculation. They do not exist. You're thinking of Maltego, and it's very far from what is being described. Palantir makes software, not a panopticon for their own use. High frequency trading is entirely unrelated to scrounging the deep dark web for crumbs to stitch together forum accounts. This is a fantasy spurred on by too many dark mirror episodes, nobody does stuff like that for the hell of it. Storing the amount of data we're talking about is expensive. Collecting it is expensive. Processing it is expensive. There's little money to be made with it, but it sounds really good if you don't think too hard about it. It's illuminati conspiracy mumbo jumbo for nerds.
        LargoLasskhyfv 6y ago
        Chill...
  - nl 6y ago
    This really isn't how this works. Stylometry is a thing, sure. But it's rarely accurate enough to use on bulk archives in an automated way, especially when archives come from different domains (eg, technical vs social writing). It's useful for identifying possible alternate authors plays attributed to Shakespeare[1], but a lot less useful for trying to tie a reddit identity to a github profile. Anyways, what can be done probabably will be done, for whichever reason because it's getting cheaper and cheaper. Crawling and storing is cheap, but analysis is harder. Automated spell checking ("probabably" above not withstanding!) and auto-complete means stylometry is even less useful now. Source: myself - I work in natural language processing, and have talked to people applying these techniques. [1] https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.00289/full https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.0028...
    - LargoLasskhyfv 6y ago
      Consider the spelling "chaff" for Rokos Basilisk :)
dumpsterdiver 6y ago
For any who are interested in witnessing a fictionalized example of applied Stylometry, I highly suggest the Star Wars Thrawn series by Timothy Zahn. Thrawn's specialty is making tactical inferences based on the physical art pieces created by a culture. It's a really interesting read, but don't take my word for it!
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]