7 ms·

Tell HN: Reminder that your LinkedIn profile is fully visible to site members

51 points by ern 3y ago

I had a bad service experience with a bank employee last week who acted in what can best be described as a slightly deranged way; I was disturbed to receive an email from LinkedIn this week stating that someone from the same bank had searched for me (and presumably viewed my profile anonymously). I decided to have a look at my profile from that of my spouse (we aren't connections and they don't really use LinkedIn) and I was shocked to see lots of detail fully exposed, despite me setting privacy settings at the maximum. Unlike Facebook, which has had the ability to lock your profile down for years, LinkedIn still exposes most of your details to potential stalkers. Even Twitter/X has the ability to make your profile private (although who knows how long that will last). I'm sure most people on HN are aware of this, but if you're in danger of being stalked, and you've locked your socials down, you're still at high risk because your LinkedIn profile is wide open to anyone with an email address who registers on the site.

not1ofU 3y ago
There is an option from linkedin to view your public profile - go to your profile and there is a link labled "Public profile & URL" in the top right corner. I believe it shows a view from perspective of non-logged user, however, the visibility options with in the profile are decent enough (even if they do 'update' from time to time). There are options Public(everyone), linkedin users, your connections, only you. I am no fan of linkedin, but all of these socials "require" (not really, but its good practise) the user to check these things on first setup and periodically just in case of 'updates'. Although thank you for posting, I never thought to view my profile from a person that I am not connected withs POV.
- ern 3y ago
  There's no way to hide your work history, education, recommendations or certifications from any logged-in user.
  - PennRobotics 3y ago
    I have toggles for all of these things. In fact, you can go more granular and select whether you want current and/or past experience as well as the details or just the summaries. On the Public Profile settings, this is all under Edit Visibility on the right side.
    - ern 3y ago
      I have public profile visibility set to off, have had it for years. I'm pretty sure those settings just change how you look to people who are NOT logged in.
      - ayewo 3y ago
        As you found out, I dont think LinkedIn offers controls to restrict what logged in users can view. I think they used to, but they slowly removed those privacy-respecting features when they had pressure to grow aggressively (like Facebook). IIRC, I think it started around when they became a public company and the stock was underperforming.
  - Nextgrid 3y ago
    Isn't the whole purpose of LinkedIn to show that to potential employers/business connections? It's kinda like paying for a billboard and then complaining that people actually see the billboard. That's the point. If people seeing your work history is a security risk for you, don't sign up for LinkedIn to begin with or make up fake details.
    - NoZebra120vClip 3y ago
      I wonder if a prospective employer views your LI page, sees falsified information, and having made a positive hiring decision based mostly on that, terminates and sues you for misrepresentation. Is lying on LI akin to lying on your résumé, or is it more like lying on Facebook?
      - thfuran 3y ago
        >Is lying on LI akin to lying on your résumé If you've never interacted with the company on linked in, not even remotely.
        NoZebra120vClip 3y ago
        Okay so you realize that recruiters and hiring managers use LI all the time, right? That they have paid accounts that can power-search candidates without ever having been sent a résumé or an application, that they can find prospective hires and then reach out to them right away with a connection request or a DM? So if I've never interacted with 99% of companies and I put some really good whoppers on my profile, and then one of those strangers finds me exactly because of what I put in my LI profile, and then they reach out to me asking for an interview, what's the etiquette on that? Should I delete/revise the lying liar bullshit immediately? Should I let it ride and tell the HM privately? Should I just let them believe it until I get hired? I found out about 23 years ago that it's actually not a good idea to lie on social media, even about something trivial. Because you start needing to keep track of how you lied, and who you lied to, to keep the stories straight. And eventually you're the one trapped in a web of lies and everyone says "I told you so." Why not just fill out your LI profile truthfully in the first place? Is there a downside to that?
  - Raed667 3y ago
    There is. You need to go to settings and then privacy. It is a whole bunch of toggles over half a dozen pages but it is all there.
    - ern 3y ago
      I'd recommend that you actually try that, and then view it with a different logged-in profile. It's all still visible.
      - mikeyouse 3y ago
        Especially if you pay for LinkedIn - basically gives you God mode to view profiles and meta data.
      - Raed667 3y ago
        If we're not a connexion, can you see anything on my profile besides name, city, current job? https://www.linkedin.com/in/xyz-xyz https://www.linkedin.com/in/xyz-xyz EDIT: link redacted.
        ern 3y ago
        <REDACTED. I think you’ve seen that I provided enough> It’s all there (I’m trying to not give away too much, we’re not connections, but I can see your education and your work history and your endorsements, let me know if you want more proof). EDIT: looks like you updated the link. ~Let me know if you want me to delete the info I found.~
        Raed667 3y ago
        That is very creepy. So the privacy settings they have are only valid for not logged in people?
jacquesm 3y ago
You should definitely file a complaint with the bank, that person is well outside their mandate by stalking you outside of your interaction with the bank. KYC is one thing, stalking your customers prior or after interacting with them is creepy AF.
- piker 3y ago
  Maybe get a bit more info before encouraging pitchforks... was it an employee of Bank of America or First-Second Bank of Boise? Most people will likely agree that they get random views all the time. This may be entirely coincidental. The footprint of the bank would provide some context.
  - ern 3y ago
    Without giving too much away, it's a small bank. My name is not common at all (in fact I'm probably the only person in the world with my first+last name). You wouldn't find me unless you're actively looking.
    - cryptonym 3y ago
      That person may not have actively searched your name. Recommendation algorithm may find a link in an unexpected way between the two of you. The world is not that big. That can also be a creep. You cannot know for sure.
- kwanbix 3y ago
  How does he know it was that same person?
Raed667 3y ago
Same thing happened to my girlfriend when she registered at a marathon. A volunteer took note of her name and phone number when she picked her bib and kit. Then he proceeded to message her on multiple social networks. We reported it to the organizers but we received no follow-up.
- breitling 3y ago
  Stalking at a marathon is way too easy. If you see someone you want to know more about, just look at their bib. Based on the bib number and/or their partial name that's printed, you can check out the results and they give you a full breakdown about their location, age, and full name. You could even get their photos from the race. Take those details to social media and you'll have a field day.
- sixstringtheory 3y ago
  I hate giving out contact info now because of this kind of thing. Once I verbally told a counter employee my phone number and immediately started receiving dick pics. There were only two other people in the waiting area but it could’ve even been the employee, who knows? Now I never say it, I’ll write it on paper and take it with me afterwards, but maybe I’ll start saying “I don’t like giving out that info, but if you must have it, I’ll make a trade: I’ll give you mine and you give me yours.”
  - civilitty 3y ago
    > Now I never say it, I’ll write it on paper and take it with me afterwards, but maybe I’ll start saying “I don’t like giving out that info, but if you must have it, I’ll make a trade: I’ll give you mine and you give me yours.” That just sounds like a gateway to even more dick pics.
    - sixstringtheory 3y ago
      I was hoping more for the aha moment where they realize how invasive it is to ask for the information. Of course this won't matter because the poor counter employee has no control. It's faceless corporations taking this information, the responsibility is too diluted for anyone to turn that ship around.
blueflow 3y ago
Don't have public profiles (or visibility in general) except when you are able to deal with the stalkers. The problem gets worse the more popular you are.
baking 3y ago
I'm just going to say it. I have had little difficulty finding all the linkedin profiles for employees in small companies (~100 employees.) Go to the linkedin page for a company and click where it says the number of employees. Click on any employee with a public profile and peruse the "People also viewed" and "People you may know" columns on the right-hand side making sure to click "show more." Keep opening new tabs, rinse and repeat. For a larger company I once wrote a python script to do the same which helped with avoiding duplication. If you are stuck trying to find a profile for someone and they have a picture, do a reverse image search with the company and job title and it will usually find them. I would regard any information you put on LinkedIn as public information no matter what your privacy settings are. I use a basically new LinkedIn account for my searches.
- pevey 3y ago
  I work a lot with startups/small companies, but not necessarily tech savvy ones. They have a hard time understanding at first why they are so targeted with phishing attempts. Often times, leadership comes from big roles at larger companies, and they are anchored in their previous experience at big company. They don't understand why anyone would bother targeting little co. I try my best to explain why little co is actually a far more ideal target. They are hiring quickly, and unlike at a big company, it is likely that even junior new employees might expect to have some interaction with the CEO. An email supposedly from the CEO at big company would be obvious spam for most employees, but not at a startup. And the information exists to make these targeted emails believable, and IT ALL COMES FROM LINKEDIN. As soon as a new hire updated their employer to little co on LinkedIn, they would be targeted relentlessly.
  - leetcrew 3y ago
    ignorant question perhaps, but what makes the CEO of a small company so much juicier a target than a senior manager or director at a large one? both could have access to sensitive info, ability to spend a lot of money before it's noticed, etc.
    - pevey 3y ago
dommer 3y ago
Slightly related. Visible.cx has a free service that reports what an AI would report on your linked in profile. If anyone is interested in seeing their report sign up: https://www.visible.cx/?r=domini996z https://www.visible.cx/?r=domini996z [Full Transparency, that link has my referral id so I can get early access. Drop the query section if you want.]
quest29 3y ago
if you not using linkedin, hibernate your account. you can reactivate anytime.
_d3Xt3r_ 3y ago
I'm surprised people still use LinkedIn, in spite of knowing how scummy they are. I deleted my account long ago, just prior to the time they got sued for spamming people (and even deleting my account didn't stop the invite spam, so I had to block the domain). But every now and then I stumble upon a LinkedIn profile (when I'm looking up people via a Google search or something) and it's always shocking to see how much info people are sharing willingly - from their profile picture, to their entire work history, all the connections they have - all visible without even needing to login. It's basically Facebook-level of personal detail, minus the drunk and embarrassing photos. I can understand "normies" using LinkedIn because they don't know any better, but it shocks me that even the so-called privacy conscious and techy people like the ones here on HN are actively supporting such a shitty organization - the same people who wouldn't hesitate to criticize Meta for their privacy violations.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- dorfsmay 3y ago
  Most potential employers will check your LinkedIn profile before even talking to you.
  - jehb 3y ago
    In my experience as a hiring manager, I will do a web search. If the LinkedIn result is what I find first that I'm sure is you, I'll click that, but if you have a personal homepage, I'd actually probably rather see that. YMMV, of course.
- invalidname 3y ago
  Got lots of jobs and opportunities through there. More than all other channels combined. Without sending out any solicitations or anything. Just posting and having my LinkedIn profile public. To be fair 96% of the people who contact me aren't relevant. But I still made nice bank on the 4% who were and it just meant answering a message...
- dopidopHN 3y ago
sam0x17 3y ago
More crucially, HR managers at a lot of startups now have apps that will notify them if you change basically _anything_ on your LinkedIn. I have a friend who took a part-time "CTO" position that was basically a very small startup trying to look better to investors and didn't involve any real work on his part beyond a weekly meeting, who was fired from his main gig _within minutes_ of him adding this line to his LinkedIn. So yeah, I'm personally all for a LinkedIn replacement that lets the candidate specify broad permissions like "don't show this line to anyone affiliated with X". Heck, I'd even make one if I had the time.
- lolinder 3y ago
  That kind of fine-grained permission scheme just gives a false sense of security if signups are open to the public—that HR department would just sign up for another account and avoid linking it to the company.
  - sam0x17 3y ago
    True, but the problem right now is apps doing this on HR departments' behalf. If you make the site robustly immune to scraping and bots and take active steps to disable such apps (LinkedIn, if anything, probably sees the existence of these apps as a feature that makes businesses like them), you'd see a lot less of this sort of thing in the wild LinkedIn is business-first, not candidate first, and that's part of the problem. Like imagine if instead of a global searchable index, you can generate as many unique profiles as you like and give whichever version to whichever company you want and can reasonably expect that only people that company has shown that link to will see it. Then you can have some anonymized way for businesses to "discover" candidates and they can send a request for a full profile. Heck, if the talent pool is good enough, you could even make _them_ pay to _ask_ the user for a full profile. If one were to make such a "candidate-first" platform, it would theoretically be a lot easier to get tons of profiles on there, since the scale is tipped in their favor. They (and not businesses) are the majority in this situation, so it's natural that services like this should cater to the real primary user and have businesses foot the bill. edit: now I want to do it X_X
pierat 3y ago
Not at all surprised. At my old company, we had a theory that most of our spearphishing was coming from LI. So we tested it. I had permission to create a completely fake person, fake role, fake experience, etc. And they got a corpo email. It took 2 days from LI profile creation. After that, our CTO gave out a recommendation to the company to set their current employer to private to prevent spearphishing, and to change it back after leaving the company.
- timmb 3y ago
  What does spearfishing mean?
  - pierat 3y ago
    It's spearphishing, intentional spelling. And after a very simple 1 word google search: "the fraudulent practice of sending emails ostensibly from a known or trusted sender in order to induce targeted individuals to reveal confidential information"
    - timmb 3y ago
      Only if you spell it right! I got “Spearfishing is fishing using handheld elongated, sharp-pointed tools such as a spear, gig, or harpoon, to impaling the fish in the body”
HumblyTossed 3y ago
I love to look at the profiles of my coworkers to see how they describe what they do at work. I don't tend to do a very good job of "selling" myself, so it's pretty enlightening how others do it.
lolinder 3y ago
That sucks about the bank employee, but I'm surprised that you're surprised that everything is visible. LinkedIn isn't like Facebook or Instagram, where many people would prefer to just interact with people they know—its entire point is to have a public profile that potential employers and recruiters can stumble upon! If you're not interested in that, you probably don't want a LinkedIn profile at all. Incidentally, this is a large part of why the actual social portion of LinkedIn is so bizarre: everyone is aware that things posted on there are associated with their real name and resume, so it's developed a weird, sanitized, corporate atmosphere.
morkalork 3y ago
Any company that builds a messaging system then inserts ads into it under the guise of a DM notification is complete trash and has zero respect for its users. Also completely unprofessional from a site that purports itself as a site for professionals.
janosdebugs 3y ago
Does anyone here derive any value from LI over just sending in a CV? In all my years of having a profile I had never gotten any good job offers. We also ran several experiments among friends on publishing content, got high 5-low 5 digit views and only single or low double digit clickthroughs.
- consoomer 3y ago
  I closed mine years ago (self employed, don't need it for jobs, etc). I reopened it a year ago because potential enterprise customers were sketched out they couldn't find me on LinkedIn (I have a personal site, etc, but they didn't seem to care for that). I guess for them, if it's not on LinkedIn it's not real (what a weird opinion to have).
- boringg 3y ago
  I got a job from a cold reach out to a VP at a company but that was 10 years ago before LI got so low quality. My profile probably didn't make a difference -- my guess is that if anything your profile can only disqualify you.
- pantsforbirds 3y ago
  I've had pretty good experiences with it. Most of my jobs have come over LinkedIn from recruiters reaching out and my current job (which I really love) came from applying to jobs on LinkedIn.
- invalidname 3y ago
  I never send out CVs and haven't in ages. But I get a lot of contacts on LinkedIn with job offers. To be fair, I very rarely take a job offer because I'm so picky (and expensive) but I did get a lot of other opportunities (speaking engagements, writing opportunities etc.). I might be an outlier though. I wrote a few books and have a big CV with a lot of experience. My kind of background doesn't really fit for most jobs.
- leetcrew 3y ago
  I get a lot of cold messages from recruiters inviting me to apply to jobs that are slightly less desirable than my current one. I've never pursued any of these, but I get the impression that are at least serious. nice to have as a backup, I guess? I also used to get lots of messages from FAANG recruiters, but I never got the impression they would prioritize my application over the general pool. I mainly use LI as a tool to track where my former coworkers ended up. I find a lot of people that would never bother keeping in touch over email are happy to refer you to their current employer.
consoomer 3y ago
Once you have kids and meet other parents you will quickly find a whole lot of people you meet are randomly looking you up on LinkedIn...
kwanbix 3y ago
I don't see any personal information such as address or phone number or even email visible. What information are you referring to?
dorfsmay 3y ago
LinkedIn is slowly getting worse in order to maximize revenue. A few examples: - hiding profiles if you're not logged in (I know, for now you can keep reloading) - preventing you from DM'ing people you are not connected to - allowing anybody who pays for premium to DM you, even when multiple users have reported that account as a spammer - literally changing the definition of what spam is to something confusing so that scammers selling "services" to do your work for you and selling overpriced "training" don't match the definition.

51 points by ern 3y ago

not1ofU 3y ago

There is an option from linkedin to view your public profile - go to your profile and there is a link labled "Public profile & URL" in the top right corner. I believe it shows a view from perspective of non-logged user, however, the visibility options with in the profile are decent enough (even if they do 'update' from time to time). There are options Public(everyone), linkedin users, your connections, only you. I am no fan of linkedin, but all of these socials "require" (not really, but its good practise) the user to check these things on first setup and periodically just in case of 'updates'. Although thank you for posting, I never thought to view my profile from a person that I am not connected withs POV.

ern 3y ago
There's no way to hide your work history, education, recommendations or certifications from any logged-in user.
- PennRobotics 3y ago
  I have toggles for all of these things. In fact, you can go more granular and select whether you want current and/or past experience as well as the details or just the summaries. On the Public Profile settings, this is all under Edit Visibility on the right side.
  - ern 3y ago
    I have public profile visibility set to off, have had it for years. I'm pretty sure those settings just change how you look to people who are NOT logged in.
    - ayewo 3y ago
      As you found out, I dont think LinkedIn offers controls to restrict what logged in users can view. I think they used to, but they slowly removed those privacy-respecting features when they had pressure to grow aggressively (like Facebook). IIRC, I think it started around when they became a public company and the stock was underperforming.
- Nextgrid 3y ago
  Isn't the whole purpose of LinkedIn to show that to potential employers/business connections? It's kinda like paying for a billboard and then complaining that people actually see the billboard. That's the point. If people seeing your work history is a security risk for you, don't sign up for LinkedIn to begin with or make up fake details.
  - NoZebra120vClip 3y ago
    I wonder if a prospective employer views your LI page, sees falsified information, and having made a positive hiring decision based mostly on that, terminates and sues you for misrepresentation. Is lying on LI akin to lying on your résumé, or is it more like lying on Facebook?
    - thfuran 3y ago
      >Is lying on LI akin to lying on your résumé If you've never interacted with the company on linked in, not even remotely.
      - NoZebra120vClip 3y ago
        Okay so you realize that recruiters and hiring managers use LI all the time, right? That they have paid accounts that can power-search candidates without ever having been sent a résumé or an application, that they can find prospective hires and then reach out to them right away with a connection request or a DM? So if I've never interacted with 99% of companies and I put some really good whoppers on my profile, and then one of those strangers finds me exactly because of what I put in my LI profile, and then they reach out to me asking for an interview, what's the etiquette on that? Should I delete/revise the lying liar bullshit immediately? Should I let it ride and tell the HM privately? Should I just let them believe it until I get hired? I found out about 23 years ago that it's actually not a good idea to lie on social media, even about something trivial. Because you start needing to keep track of how you lied, and who you lied to, to keep the stories straight. And eventually you're the one trapped in a web of lies and everyone says "I told you so." Why not just fill out your LI profile truthfully in the first place? Is there a downside to that?
- Raed667 3y ago
  There is. You need to go to settings and then privacy. It is a whole bunch of toggles over half a dozen pages but it is all there.
  - ern 3y ago
    I'd recommend that you actually try that, and then view it with a different logged-in profile. It's all still visible.
    - mikeyouse 3y ago
      Especially if you pay for LinkedIn - basically gives you God mode to view profiles and meta data.
    - Raed667 3y ago
      If we're not a connexion, can you see anything on my profile besides name, city, current job? https://www.linkedin.com/in/xyz-xyz https://www.linkedin.com/in/xyz-xyz EDIT: link redacted.
      - ern 3y ago
        <REDACTED. I think you’ve seen that I provided enough> It’s all there (I’m trying to not give away too much, we’re not connections, but I can see your education and your work history and your endorsements, let me know if you want more proof). EDIT: looks like you updated the link. ~Let me know if you want me to delete the info I found.~
        Raed667 3y ago
        That is very creepy. So the privacy settings they have are only valid for not logged in people?

jacquesm 3y ago

You should definitely file a complaint with the bank, that person is well outside their mandate by stalking you outside of your interaction with the bank. KYC is one thing, stalking your customers prior or after interacting with them is creepy AF.

piker 3y ago
Maybe get a bit more info before encouraging pitchforks... was it an employee of Bank of America or First-Second Bank of Boise? Most people will likely agree that they get random views all the time. This may be entirely coincidental. The footprint of the bank would provide some context.
- ern 3y ago
  Without giving too much away, it's a small bank. My name is not common at all (in fact I'm probably the only person in the world with my first+last name). You wouldn't find me unless you're actively looking.
  - cryptonym 3y ago
    That person may not have actively searched your name. Recommendation algorithm may find a link in an unexpected way between the two of you. The world is not that big. That can also be a creep. You cannot know for sure.
kwanbix 3y ago
How does he know it was that same person?

Raed667 3y ago

Same thing happened to my girlfriend when she registered at a marathon. A volunteer took note of her name and phone number when she picked her bib and kit. Then he proceeded to message her on multiple social networks. We reported it to the organizers but we received no follow-up.

breitling 3y ago
Stalking at a marathon is way too easy. If you see someone you want to know more about, just look at their bib. Based on the bib number and/or their partial name that's printed, you can check out the results and they give you a full breakdown about their location, age, and full name. You could even get their photos from the race. Take those details to social media and you'll have a field day.
sixstringtheory 3y ago
I hate giving out contact info now because of this kind of thing. Once I verbally told a counter employee my phone number and immediately started receiving dick pics. There were only two other people in the waiting area but it could’ve even been the employee, who knows? Now I never say it, I’ll write it on paper and take it with me afterwards, but maybe I’ll start saying “I don’t like giving out that info, but if you must have it, I’ll make a trade: I’ll give you mine and you give me yours.”
- civilitty 3y ago
  > Now I never say it, I’ll write it on paper and take it with me afterwards, but maybe I’ll start saying “I don’t like giving out that info, but if you must have it, I’ll make a trade: I’ll give you mine and you give me yours.” That just sounds like a gateway to even more dick pics.
  - sixstringtheory 3y ago
    I was hoping more for the aha moment where they realize how invasive it is to ask for the information. Of course this won't matter because the poor counter employee has no control. It's faceless corporations taking this information, the responsibility is too diluted for anyone to turn that ship around.

blueflow 3y ago

Don't have public profiles (or visibility in general) except when you are able to deal with the stalkers. The problem gets worse the more popular you are.

baking 3y ago

I'm just going to say it. I have had little difficulty finding all the linkedin profiles for employees in small companies (~100 employees.) Go to the linkedin page for a company and click where it says the number of employees. Click on any employee with a public profile and peruse the "People also viewed" and "People you may know" columns on the right-hand side making sure to click "show more." Keep opening new tabs, rinse and repeat. For a larger company I once wrote a python script to do the same which helped with avoiding duplication. If you are stuck trying to find a profile for someone and they have a picture, do a reverse image search with the company and job title and it will usually find them. I would regard any information you put on LinkedIn as public information no matter what your privacy settings are. I use a basically new LinkedIn account for my searches.

pevey 3y ago
I work a lot with startups/small companies, but not necessarily tech savvy ones. They have a hard time understanding at first why they are so targeted with phishing attempts. Often times, leadership comes from big roles at larger companies, and they are anchored in their previous experience at big company. They don't understand why anyone would bother targeting little co. I try my best to explain why little co is actually a far more ideal target. They are hiring quickly, and unlike at a big company, it is likely that even junior new employees might expect to have some interaction with the CEO. An email supposedly from the CEO at big company would be obvious spam for most employees, but not at a startup. And the information exists to make these targeted emails believable, and IT ALL COMES FROM LINKEDIN. As soon as a new hire updated their employer to little co on LinkedIn, they would be targeted relentlessly.
- leetcrew 3y ago
  ignorant question perhaps, but what makes the CEO of a small company so much juicier a target than a senior manager or director at a large one? both could have access to sensitive info, ability to spend a lot of money before it's noticed, etc.
  - pevey 3y ago

dommer 3y ago

Slightly related. Visible.cx has a free service that reports what an AI would report on your linked in profile. If anyone is interested in seeing their report sign up: https://www.visible.cx/?r=domini996z https://www.visible.cx/?r=domini996z [Full Transparency, that link has my referral id so I can get early access. Drop the query section if you want.]

quest29 3y ago

if you not using linkedin, hibernate your account. you can reactivate anytime.

_d3Xt3r_ 3y ago

I'm surprised people still use LinkedIn, in spite of knowing how scummy they are. I deleted my account long ago, just prior to the time they got sued for spamming people (and even deleting my account didn't stop the invite spam, so I had to block the domain). But every now and then I stumble upon a LinkedIn profile (when I'm looking up people via a Google search or something) and it's always shocking to see how much info people are sharing willingly - from their profile picture, to their entire work history, all the connections they have - all visible without even needing to login. It's basically Facebook-level of personal detail, minus the drunk and embarrassing photos. I can understand "normies" using LinkedIn because they don't know any better, but it shocks me that even the so-called privacy conscious and techy people like the ones here on HN are actively supporting such a shitty organization - the same people who wouldn't hesitate to criticize Meta for their privacy violations.

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
dorfsmay 3y ago
Most potential employers will check your LinkedIn profile before even talking to you.
- jehb 3y ago
  In my experience as a hiring manager, I will do a web search. If the LinkedIn result is what I find first that I'm sure is you, I'll click that, but if you have a personal homepage, I'd actually probably rather see that. YMMV, of course.
invalidname 3y ago
Got lots of jobs and opportunities through there. More than all other channels combined. Without sending out any solicitations or anything. Just posting and having my LinkedIn profile public. To be fair 96% of the people who contact me aren't relevant. But I still made nice bank on the 4% who were and it just meant answering a message...
dopidopHN 3y ago

sam0x17 3y ago

More crucially, HR managers at a lot of startups now have apps that will notify them if you change basically _anything_ on your LinkedIn. I have a friend who took a part-time "CTO" position that was basically a very small startup trying to look better to investors and didn't involve any real work on his part beyond a weekly meeting, who was fired from his main gig _within minutes_ of him adding this line to his LinkedIn. So yeah, I'm personally all for a LinkedIn replacement that lets the candidate specify broad permissions like "don't show this line to anyone affiliated with X". Heck, I'd even make one if I had the time.

lolinder 3y ago
That kind of fine-grained permission scheme just gives a false sense of security if signups are open to the public—that HR department would just sign up for another account and avoid linking it to the company.
- sam0x17 3y ago
  True, but the problem right now is apps doing this on HR departments' behalf. If you make the site robustly immune to scraping and bots and take active steps to disable such apps (LinkedIn, if anything, probably sees the existence of these apps as a feature that makes businesses like them), you'd see a lot less of this sort of thing in the wild LinkedIn is business-first, not candidate first, and that's part of the problem. Like imagine if instead of a global searchable index, you can generate as many unique profiles as you like and give whichever version to whichever company you want and can reasonably expect that only people that company has shown that link to will see it. Then you can have some anonymized way for businesses to "discover" candidates and they can send a request for a full profile. Heck, if the talent pool is good enough, you could even make _them_ pay to _ask_ the user for a full profile. If one were to make such a "candidate-first" platform, it would theoretically be a lot easier to get tons of profiles on there, since the scale is tipped in their favor. They (and not businesses) are the majority in this situation, so it's natural that services like this should cater to the real primary user and have businesses foot the bill. edit: now I want to do it X_X

pierat 3y ago

Not at all surprised. At my old company, we had a theory that most of our spearphishing was coming from LI. So we tested it. I had permission to create a completely fake person, fake role, fake experience, etc. And they got a corpo email. It took 2 days from LI profile creation. After that, our CTO gave out a recommendation to the company to set their current employer to private to prevent spearphishing, and to change it back after leaving the company.

timmb 3y ago
What does spearfishing mean?
- pierat 3y ago
  It's spearphishing, intentional spelling. And after a very simple 1 word google search: "the fraudulent practice of sending emails ostensibly from a known or trusted sender in order to induce targeted individuals to reveal confidential information"
  - timmb 3y ago
    Only if you spell it right! I got “Spearfishing is fishing using handheld elongated, sharp-pointed tools such as a spear, gig, or harpoon, to impaling the fish in the body”

HumblyTossed 3y ago

I love to look at the profiles of my coworkers to see how they describe what they do at work. I don't tend to do a very good job of "selling" myself, so it's pretty enlightening how others do it.

lolinder 3y ago

That sucks about the bank employee, but I'm surprised that you're surprised that everything is visible. LinkedIn isn't like Facebook or Instagram, where many people would prefer to just interact with people they know—its entire point is to have a public profile that potential employers and recruiters can stumble upon! If you're not interested in that, you probably don't want a LinkedIn profile at all. Incidentally, this is a large part of why the actual social portion of LinkedIn is so bizarre: everyone is aware that things posted on there are associated with their real name and resume, so it's developed a weird, sanitized, corporate atmosphere.

morkalork 3y ago

Any company that builds a messaging system then inserts ads into it under the guise of a DM notification is complete trash and has zero respect for its users. Also completely unprofessional from a site that purports itself as a site for professionals.

janosdebugs 3y ago

Does anyone here derive any value from LI over just sending in a CV? In all my years of having a profile I had never gotten any good job offers. We also ran several experiments among friends on publishing content, got high 5-low 5 digit views and only single or low double digit clickthroughs.

consoomer 3y ago
I closed mine years ago (self employed, don't need it for jobs, etc). I reopened it a year ago because potential enterprise customers were sketched out they couldn't find me on LinkedIn (I have a personal site, etc, but they didn't seem to care for that). I guess for them, if it's not on LinkedIn it's not real (what a weird opinion to have).
boringg 3y ago
I got a job from a cold reach out to a VP at a company but that was 10 years ago before LI got so low quality. My profile probably didn't make a difference -- my guess is that if anything your profile can only disqualify you.
pantsforbirds 3y ago
I've had pretty good experiences with it. Most of my jobs have come over LinkedIn from recruiters reaching out and my current job (which I really love) came from applying to jobs on LinkedIn.
invalidname 3y ago
I never send out CVs and haven't in ages. But I get a lot of contacts on LinkedIn with job offers. To be fair, I very rarely take a job offer because I'm so picky (and expensive) but I did get a lot of other opportunities (speaking engagements, writing opportunities etc.). I might be an outlier though. I wrote a few books and have a big CV with a lot of experience. My kind of background doesn't really fit for most jobs.
leetcrew 3y ago
I get a lot of cold messages from recruiters inviting me to apply to jobs that are slightly less desirable than my current one. I've never pursued any of these, but I get the impression that are at least serious. nice to have as a backup, I guess? I also used to get lots of messages from FAANG recruiters, but I never got the impression they would prioritize my application over the general pool. I mainly use LI as a tool to track where my former coworkers ended up. I find a lot of people that would never bother keeping in touch over email are happy to refer you to their current employer.

consoomer 3y ago

Once you have kids and meet other parents you will quickly find a whole lot of people you meet are randomly looking you up on LinkedIn...

kwanbix 3y ago

I don't see any personal information such as address or phone number or even email visible. What information are you referring to?

dorfsmay 3y ago

LinkedIn is slowly getting worse in order to maximize revenue. A few examples: - hiding profiles if you're not logged in (I know, for now you can keep reloading) - preventing you from DM'ing people you are not connected to - allowing anybody who pays for premium to DM you, even when multiple users have reported that account as a spammer - literally changing the definition of what spam is to something confusing so that scammers selling "services" to do your work for you and selling overpriced "training" don't match the definition.