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The number “168” you referenced reflects the number of data brokers we cover, not the total number of times you’ve been “found”. I can see how this would be co

The number “168” you referenced reflects the number of data brokers we cover, not the total number of times you’ve been “found”. I can see how this would be confusing though, so it is a good reminder to us that we need to implement better tool tips to make this more clear. In the screenshots you shared, see where it says “Your Exposure Risk Scan is in Progress”, with the green hourglass icon below it? That means your scan has not been completed yet, so actually we do not claim to have found you anywhere yet. If you input a fake name (as you mentioned), you will of course get bogus results. When you click through the links after inputting a fake name, you should expect to see 404 pages or “Not found” pages at the data brokers as you described. This is because of course the data broker cannot find the fake name you entered. I also can see how this may be confusing, so another reminder to us that we need to do a better job of implementing tool tips to make this more clear. Even if you input a real name, the “View” links will not always generate results. Here’s a quote from our Getting Started page where we explain how this works: “Sometimes these links are not perfect, and other people may be listed, or you might not be there at all, but in most cases, they allow you to quickly view a snapshot of where your personal details are exposed online. The quality of our results sometimes varies, for example, if you have a common name like “John Smith” or “Mary Smith”, it might be difficult to find your profiles among many others with the same name. Adding a middle name or a full birthdate to your Optery profile often helps. Keep in mind, we are constantly improving our platform, and we have a lot of things in the works to improve these results.” Link to full page here: https://www.optery.com/getting-started/ https://www.optery.com/getting-started/

ParanoidalMouse 5y ago
So, your explanation basically confirms that right now your dashboard shows fake results. You call these results “autogenerated profile link at [data broker site] for [name at city, state].” Instead of a link which “you can click through to view your profile” as advertised on your site, many of those links lead to 404 or some random page on a data broker site because your system has found nothing. In case of a bogus name, 100% of those links are fake. I call them fake because they are what they are - imitations of “found” results. Just to clarify, a “bogus name” test is a quick way to check if a privacy service does a real search on data broker sites or just imitates that it found something. For a bogus name I’d expect to see 0 profiles found as a result of a scan. That would be logical and ethical. To sum up, you invite people to register at your service and give away their PII. Then, these people get fake results in exchange for their PII and are invited to sign up and pay. Then, a user expresses her concern to the founders and they say that it is ok for a privacy service to act like this. At least Optery is useless and a waste of time, at worst this service is unethical. With this type of reaction from founders, I’d think twice before sending them any personal data or having anything to do with them at all.
- beyondd 5y ago
  You have a brand new account with no comment history other than this post, yet you’ve taken the time to host screen shots and write multiple disparaging comments with baseless accusations to this post. It sounds like you’re either having a difficult time understanding how our product works, or your motivations are insincere. If your concerns are sincere, please feel free to create a ticket in our help desk and we would be happy to setup a personal demo for you to show you how our product works and address your concerns. https://help.optery.com https://help.optery.com
  - ParanoidalMouse 5y ago
    Thank you for your suggestion to “set up a personal demo… to address my concerns”. I’d prefer that you don’t flag credible critical comments regarding your service and answer them in the open. The comment that you’ve flagged contained links to screenshots that prove 1) you use scam mechanics; 2) your service does not work as advertised (if works at all). Yes, I have a difficult time understanding why your service finds 168 “links” on data broker sites for a bogus name search. If your service performs a real time scan of data broker sites, it should find 0 profiles when it searches for a bogus name. Please answer a simple question why this is not the case. Some proofs once again: https://postimg.cc/rD93R2TG https://postimg.cc/rD93R2TG (Search results for non-existing name and city on data brokers sites) https://postimg.cc/BXpdLb2s https://postimg.cc/BXpdLb2s (Non-existing profile on addresses.com Optery dashboard report links to) It doesn’t matter when I created my HN account and how many comments I have. What matters is you wrote blatant lies on your site: “Our dashboard provides dynamically generated custom deep links you can click through to view your profile”. Even if some links are real, the majority are not. Sad.

ParanoidalMouse 5y ago

So, your explanation basically confirms that right now your dashboard shows fake results. You call these results “autogenerated profile link at [data broker site] for [name at city, state].” Instead of a link which “you can click through to view your profile” as advertised on your site, many of those links lead to 404 or some random page on a data broker site because your system has found nothing. In case of a bogus name, 100% of those links are fake. I call them fake because they are what they are - imitations of “found” results. Just to clarify, a “bogus name” test is a quick way to check if a privacy service does a real search on data broker sites or just imitates that it found something. For a bogus name I’d expect to see 0 profiles found as a result of a scan. That would be logical and ethical. To sum up, you invite people to register at your service and give away their PII. Then, these people get fake results in exchange for their PII and are invited to sign up and pay. Then, a user expresses her concern to the founders and they say that it is ok for a privacy service to act like this. At least Optery is useless and a waste of time, at worst this service is unethical. With this type of reaction from founders, I’d think twice before sending them any personal data or having anything to do with them at all.

beyondd 5y ago
You have a brand new account with no comment history other than this post, yet you’ve taken the time to host screen shots and write multiple disparaging comments with baseless accusations to this post. It sounds like you’re either having a difficult time understanding how our product works, or your motivations are insincere. If your concerns are sincere, please feel free to create a ticket in our help desk and we would be happy to setup a personal demo for you to show you how our product works and address your concerns. https://help.optery.com https://help.optery.com
- ParanoidalMouse 5y ago
  Thank you for your suggestion to “set up a personal demo… to address my concerns”. I’d prefer that you don’t flag credible critical comments regarding your service and answer them in the open. The comment that you’ve flagged contained links to screenshots that prove 1) you use scam mechanics; 2) your service does not work as advertised (if works at all). Yes, I have a difficult time understanding why your service finds 168 “links” on data broker sites for a bogus name search. If your service performs a real time scan of data broker sites, it should find 0 profiles when it searches for a bogus name. Please answer a simple question why this is not the case. Some proofs once again: https://postimg.cc/rD93R2TG https://postimg.cc/rD93R2TG (Search results for non-existing name and city on data brokers sites) https://postimg.cc/BXpdLb2s https://postimg.cc/BXpdLb2s (Non-existing profile on addresses.com Optery dashboard report links to) It doesn’t matter when I created my HN account and how many comments I have. What matters is you wrote blatant lies on your site: “Our dashboard provides dynamically generated custom deep links you can click through to view your profile”. Even if some links are real, the majority are not. Sad.