Date: Tue, 03 May 2005 11:37:18 -0400
To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at WSFA.org>
From: "Mike B." <omni at omniphile.com>
Subject: [WSFA] Re:  Re: Phone Numbers
Reply-To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at WSFA.org>

At 01:05 AM 5/3/05 -0400, Keith F. Lynch wrote:
>Five years ago, when I started placing WSFA Journals online, I first
>made sure there was a CLEAR consensus on what was acceptable.

That's good.  It didn't include me, or others who used to be in the club
but weren't at the time of the vote for whatever reason though...and data
for these people is included too though.  As I said more than once, as far
as I know so far, none of the data about me is current, so I personally
don't have a problem...that I know of.  I'm concerned about the club and
those people who might not be in the same position I'm in (all published
data obsolete, back in the club so I know about the situation, no
bloodthirsty ex hunting for me, etc.).

>The UNANIMOUS consensus was that names and phone numbers were opt-out, and
>that current street addresses and email addresses (but not towns, and
>not PO boxes, and not past street addresses) of past and present WSFA
>members were opt-in.

If I'd been there it wouldn't have been unanimous.  Phone numbers should be
opt-in as well, unless obsolete or in the phone book anyway.  P.O. Boxes
I'd have to think about...they are less of a problem than street addresses,
but could still be used for harm if someone was serious enough about it (as
many estranged spouses have proven to be for instance).

I didn't realize you had gone to the trouble of verifying the obsolescence
of street addresses and e-mail addresses before including them.  That helps
a lot with lowering the risks of harm.

>some other category of information.  But after a few such iterations,
>why even bother?  I would have just as little interest in putting up
>such bowdlerized and mangled journals as anyone would have in reading
>them.

Who reads the old journals just to get addresses and phone numbers?  Other
than mass marketers?  I'm interested more in the other things included.
The minutes of the meetings for instance are both entertaining and good
reminders of the way things were way back when (highly irreverent mostly ;-).

>We might as well shut down the club, too.  After all, you can never
>be sure that the person sitting next to you in a meeting isn't an
>FBI agent making careful notes of everything you say and do.

You seem to have missed my point, as well as a lot of what I wrote about
it.  I won't be repeating it here though.

>Sometimes I really wonder why I bother.  The people who come to
>meetings and never *do* anything get a whole lot fewer complaints.
>And the people who no longer bother to come to meetings at all get
>the fewest of all.

Nah, it's the dead people who get the fewest.  I'm sure those who no longer
come to meetings are busy getting complaints elsewhere.

>Mike, is there any information about you that's on the WSFA website
>that you would like me to remove?

I don't have any easy way of telling...there's no search function and it
will take a while to read through that many old journals.  I suspect there
isn't.  I wasn't a member during most of the time I've lived where I'm
living now, and I don't think you are putting up current information in
recent journals, which don't seem to have the address correction info that
was in the ones from the past anyway.  As I said a couple of times, I'm not
concerned for me personally here.

>What brought this on, anyway?  Was it the privacy notice that I post
>along with every new WSFA Journal availability announcement?

Yes.  That's what alerted me to the potential problem, and prompted a close
look at specific journals from the past to see what was there.  I found my
old phone number and most of my old address in one.  That suggested that
similar information for others might be listed too, and for them it might
still be valid.  I described a couple of situations in which this could be
harmful, and stated that I didn't know if those situations actually existed
or not.  At least one of them would be very serious if it did however, so
it seemed reasonable to raise the issue, so I did.

I really hope that these situations are strictly theoretical, in which case
there won't be any problems with things the way they are.  I have read of
cases where similar situations were NOT theoretical though, and serious
harm resulted, so while theoretical in our specific case, scenarios like
what I described have proven possible.

>I'm trying to bend over backwards.

I have no objections to your work.  It's been even more carefully done than
it appeared at first (which was pretty darn careful).  I appreciate being
able to see more old Journals than I might have in a box somewhere here.
Your offers to redact (thanks mjw) any objectionable personal data are
appreciated as well.  I just hope that that's enough to prevent harm.
Chances are very good that it is.  Since the damage would be really great
if it isn't though, the risk analysis thing suggested taking the safe route
anyway.  Finding that you verified that the data included was obsolete
before you included it lowers the risk considerably, probably to a
tolerable level, so I won't say more about it.  Steve Smith's experience
with his phone number being on the web adds to the comfort level re mass
marketers.  The only use I can see for obsolete address and phone number
info is for identity theft, and as I said, there are other places to get
that anyway (411.com will sell it to you for $30 for instance).  My intent
was to raise the issue, and that's been done now.  I'm glad to hear that
the risk is lower than it appeared at first.

>permission of everyone within visual range before peeking.  "Hey, you
>glanced at me without asking permission first!  I'm going to sue you
>for a Godzillion dollars and Mothra cents!"

Being looked at isn't really enough harm to sue over.  Being murdered, or
otherwise seriously hurt is, as is having your finances ruined for years.
Having your unpublished or unlisted number exposed to the world might be
for some people...at least to recover the cost of that service (it wouldn't
be for me, I'd just change the number and not give it to WSFA again).

-- Mike B.