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Just because Dave set it up as fun doesn’t mean some people will not use the info for badness.

Hey Rik, thanks for the post, it’s good to be on top of these types of scams.

A point to remember is sharing information that is also used for security question answers helps hackers regardless of the original intention.

Those saying this is “not a scam” are missing the point that it is not a good thing to do, regardless of intention.

I was the one who originally brought this to the attention of the mods last night. It appears this meme has been around for a while (google trace links an article that mentions it in Jan 05 http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2005/01/23/LVGT7ASCMR1.DTL). While I do not believe it was the intent of Dave to cause issues, he was just having fun, it would be a difficult argument to say that the original creators of the meme weren’t phishing (as one of it’s original forms was 1st pet and mother’s maiden name). The key difference between older versions of this game, and this new one is the location the game is played, twitter. The reason it is an issue is threefold: * Twitter records everything in an easily searchable fashion* Twitter is accessible to everyone (and has a huge audience)* Twitter attributes these recordings to non-anonymous accounts. While this is not enough for someone to steal your identity, it does make the job of identify thieves easier. Maybe his next game shouldn’t rely on personal security information.

OK – I’ve seen all arguments for and against. Agreed – giving personal information out on the internet is wrong, every fool knows that. BUT! going hysterical over a “game” that even in the worst case you gave your Mothers Maiden name away – how does this then move on to scamming – 1st you’d need at least a name (granted Twitter does sometimes give that) and then a service that they use – (not available on twitter) and then you’d need to know at least login details for that service (not available on twitter unless someone tweets “logging in to my bank now with username joebloggs – but im not stupid enough to give you my password”

the leap of faith to go from Porn Name to hack your account is far too much to leap. Sorry – Hysteria and scaremongering to get clicks to blogs and sites…

@pembsdave

Hi Mr M Wolf, this meme goes way back, beyond the birth of the internet,in its original form, the porn name was First pet + Mother’s maiden name, and it had a sibling called Soap Star Name which was always Middle Name + Street you grew up in..

Dave, I don’t recall saying the word scamming … I guess that’s a case of ‘chinese whispers’. My original complaint was the game ‘looked like’ a phishing expedition, and could Twitter remind users not to divulge personal info. My original shout was “WHAT THE HELL? Don’t people realize that #twitterpornnames is just a way to divulge personal info that identity thieves use? DON’T DO IT”. I have no blog or site, and therefor no agenda, so your assumption on my motives is invalid.

[...] Original [...]

Rik, as any good blogger knows, ‘citation needed’. If you are going to make a bold genralization that this meme predates the internet, please supply reference. I have supplied a reference acknowledging the meme’s existance back in Jan of 2005. That’s the furthest back I have found so far, with most of the occurrence of the meme appearing in 2006 and later forums. I would not be surprised if the meme started in IRC, and considering what information is supplied, was a social engineered phishing expedition. That it was not Dave’s intention to have this version of the meme do so does not invalidate that the meme’s purpose is to divulge security related information.

Reference to the meme from Nov, 2000 located (http://www.kuro5hin.org/comments/2000/11/2/65250/4133/217#217). Which is about 1/2 way to the ‘birth of the World Wide Web’ (assuming a birthyear of 1990, based off roughly of when it became more publically available – which is a debate for those more geekier than me). Not sure how easy it would be to find much before 2000.

I don’t get this.

Hi there, I am citing my own memory of having had this converstaion with many people in the classroom, in the playground and in the pub in the early to mid eighties.

Nothing is new, only forgotten :)

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