Permanently Deleted

  • quartz242 [she/her]M57•3 years ago

    HOly shit, the new "23 rules for life" by Jordan B. Peterson just dropped.

    1. Don't reveal your first or last name, no matter how common. Don't reveal your exact place of residence.

    2. Remove unnecessary fields from links (the text in a link that comes after ? and each field is separated from the next by a &). They often contain unique IDs for a specific click or webpage, which can be traced back to you.

    3. Don't post youtube videos below which you commented; Don't post youtube videos embedded in your playlist.

    4. Don't link social media to your discord/social media profiles unless with the intention to mislead.

    5. Don't post facebook links whatsoever, as people will hit the like button and soft-doxx themselves, and it can be seen which people are watching a stream, including yourself.

    6. Don't share artists, musicians, friends from real life, or other people who have a small circle of people around them, of which you are a part. often it can be guessed which one of the fans/friends is you. This includes fundraisers and art projects by your real-life friends: do not share them.

    7. Don't be too open about your personal life on political servers. Compartimentalize your political activism and emotional needs to different environments.

    8. Have friends outside the left that will be there for you in case you get cancelled or otherwise ostracized.

    9. Regularly google yourself and delete as much info as you can, then have google delete the links to that info. Do the same for Bing and Yandex.

    10. Regularly wipe your old discord convos using DeleteDiscordMessages.js

    11. Check the URLs to your online profiles - often they contain a username you thought you had changed long ago.

    12. Regularly spread false but unimportant info about yourself, especially on public platforms and profiles.

    13. Never send Microsoft Office documents that you created - they contain your name in the metadata.

    14. Never open a google doc in a non-private window - others will see your name in the 'currently editing' field.

    15. Use browser plugins to spoof your useragent and location, block cookies, and perform fake google searches.

    16. If there is a browser version available of a program/app you would have to install otherwise, use the browser version. E.g. discord, facebook, twitter. Installed executables/apps have access to much more information about your system.

    17. When joining hostile online environments (with e.g. political opponents), use an alt-account; hostile individuals have an incentive to doxx you.

    18. Use different account names and passwords on every site, and edit your discord name to something different on every server. Regularly change your profile picture as well. This way it is a lot more difficult for people to pass around screenshots of your messages or to keep track of your identity.

    19. Always be connected through a VPN, and ideally through a private browser window - make it more difficult for the owners of your WiFi network to see what you are doing.

    20. Remove all political content from your electronic devices when you expect they will be searched, e.g. when crossing a country border or at demonstrations.

    21. Do not talk about your activism to people when it does not clearly benefit the activism to do so.

    22. Make sure you can trust someone before talking with them about sensitive info. If they compliment you a lot, that does not mean you can trust them.

    23. Never send screenshots on impulse; always crop out the exact area of the screenshot that you want to share. Always check that no personally identifiable information is visible on your screenshot, e.g. in the tabs or bookmarks of your browser.

    Thanks @PeachFreezer1312

    • Importantguy123 [comrade/them]26•3 years ago

      Do not talk about your activism to people when it does not clearly benefit the activism to do so.

      Fuck... so I should delete that post I made about graffiti/irl opsec huh? god damnit

    • luigi [he/him]4•3 years ago

      Regularly google yourself and delete as much info as you can, then have google delete the links to that info. Do the same for Bing and Yandex.

      How would I go about deleting those links (in search results)? Is this to do with the EU's "right to be forgotten" or is there another way?

      @PeachFreezer1312

      Thanks for the tips.

        • luigi [he/him]2•3 years ago

          Thanks.

          I'm in the UK so I may have missed the boat on the EU approach lol.

          There's one link with my name showing next to a username I have elsewhere. I removed the name from the site (unfortunately there's no option to delete the account), but it's still showing in the search snippet and the cache. The process for removing seems to only apply to deliberate doxxing, which this isn't. I could try it anyway.

          Edit: Maybe the "outdated info" removal could work, since the page doesn't contain the info now.

          Do you think it would be possible to wait it out and hope the Googlebot updates the search result any time soon, with the updated page that has my name removed? It's on quite a niche website.

  • EcoSoco [he/him]M21•3 years ago

    Credit to @PeachFreezer1312 for this info (updated from earlier post):

    "Holy shit, the new "24 rules for life" by Jordan B. Peterson just dropped!

    1. Don't reveal your first or last name, no matter how common. Don't reveal your exact place of residence either.
    2. Remove unnecessary query strings from links (the text in a link that comes after ? and each field is separated from the next by a &). They often contain unique IDs for a specific click or account name, which can be traced back to you.
    3. Don't post YouTube videos below which you commented; Don't post YouTube videos embedded in your playlist.
    4. Don't link your social media to other social media profiles unless with the intention to mislead. This includes chat apps like discord.
    5. Don't post facebook links, as people will hit the like button and doxx themselves to others, and it can be seen which people are watching a stream, including yourself.
    6. Don't share small artists, friends from real life, or other people who have a small circle of people around them of which you are a part. Often it can be guessed which one of the fans/friends is you. This includes fundraisers and art projects by your real-life friends: do not share them.
    7. Don't be too open about your personal life on political servers. Compartimentalize your political activism and emotional needs to different environments.
    8. Have friends outside the left that will be there for you in case you get cancelled or otherwise ostracized.
    9. Regularly Google yourself and delete as much info as you can from the websites you encounter. Then, have Google delete the links to that info. Do the same for Bing and Yandex.
    10. Regularly wipe your old discord conversations using DeleteDiscordMessages.js, even if you're not abandoning your account.
    11. Check the URLs to your online profiles - often they contain a username you thought you had changed.
    12. Regularly spread false but unimportant info about yourself, especially on public platforms.
    13. Never send MS Office documents that you created - your name is in the metadata.
    14. Never open a google doc in a non-private window - others will see your name in the 'currently editing' field.
    15. Use browser plugins to spoof your user-agent and location, block cookies, and perform fake google searches.
    16. If there is a browser version available of a program/app you would have to install otherwise, use the browser version. Installed programs/apps have access to much more info about your system.
    17. When joining hostile online environments (with e.g. political opponents), use an alt-account; hostile individuals have an incentive to doxx you. Make accounts for this purpose in advance.
    18. Use different account names and passwords on every site, and edit your discord name to something different on every server. Regularly change your profile picture too. This way it is a lot more difficult for people to pass around screenshots of your messages or to keep track of your identity.
    19. Every once in a while, wipe and abandon your old social media accounts and make new ones. If necessary, tell people that you're moving to a new account, but do not be too open about your exact old usernames or identity.
    20. Always be connected through a VPN, and ideally through a private browser window or even Tor - make it more difficult for the owners of your WiFi network to see what you are doing.
    21. Remove all political content from your electronic devices when you expect they will be searched, e.g. when crossing a country border or at demonstrations.
    22. Do not talk about your activism to people when it does not clearly benefit the activism to do so.
    23. Make sure you can trust someone before talking with them about sensitive info. If they compliment you a lot, that does not mean you can trust them.
    24. Never send screenshots on impulse; always crop out the exact area of the screenshot that you want to share. Always check that no personally identifiable information is visible on your screenshot, e.g. in the tabs or bookmarks of your browser.

    PRIVACY TOOLS:

    Delete your content from a reddit backup server: Drop a message at https://old.reddit.com/r/pushshift/comments/kmuiy4/data_deletion_request_megathread/ or PM https://reddit.com/u/Stuck_in_the_Matrix

    Overwrite and delete your reddit comments (google chrome plugin): https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/nuke-reddit-history/aclagjkmidmkcdhkhlicmgkgmpgccaod

    Delete your discord chat history: https://github.com/victornpb/deleteDiscordMessages/blob/master/deleteDiscordMessages.js

    Remove deleted content from google: https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/removals

    remove deleted content from bing: https://www.bing.com/webmaster/tools/

    remove deleted content from yandex: https://webmaster.yandex.com/tools/del-url/

    Hide your identity from site admins while browsing: https://www.torproject.org/download/

    Use free encrypted email: https://protonmail.com/

    make sure your skype info cannot be found unless you allow it: https://support.skype.com/en/faq/FA34843/how-do-i-opt-out-of-being-visible-in-skype-search-results-or-suggestions-on-mobile-or-tablet

    Get yourself off the wayback machine: https://nixnet.xyz/blog/excluding-your-site-from-the-wayback-machine-keybase-only/

    If you live in the EU:

    remove private info from google results: https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/legal-removal-request?complaint_type=rtbf&rd=1

    remove from bing search results: https://www.bing.com/webmaster/tools/eu-privacy-request"

    • crime [she/her, any]4•3 years ago

      Great write up!

      Remove unnecessary query strings from links (the text in a link that comes after ? and each field is separated from the next by a &). They often contain unique IDs for a specific click or account name, which can be traced back to you.

      You can do this with a browser extension as well

    • MiraculousMM [he/him, any]M4•3 years ago

      It's worth noting that the pushshift data deletion queue appears to be very long and very slow. Lots of people complaining that their posts are still up on the site months after they requested scrubbing.

      • EcoSoco [he/him]M3•3 years ago

        Yeah, I was just reading about that earlier. Seems like the guy in charge of handling that has gotten lazy or something.

  • ferristriangle [he/him]17•3 years ago

    I hate that this is a thing that's necessary, because places like reddit are a great place to save and collect insightful discussion and well sourced rebuttals, and it sucks to go through posts I've saved and see half the posts and replies be deleted.

    • wantonviolins [they/them]5•3 years ago

      There are archives out there, but deleting the originals adds friction to efforts to piece together data about you.

  • PurrLure [she/her]17•3 years ago

    I deleted quite a few accounts, including Discord.

    Thanks for the reminder, I posted some serious cringe before I became a leftist. :elmofire:

          • Wmill [he/him,use name]4•3 years ago

            I might be the one true leftist though, don't wanna give away because possible dox My posts are cool and good. No :cringe: here nope. Also my jokes are great, I keep laughing at them :agony-yehaw:

  • EcoSoco [he/him]M14•3 years ago

    Another good resource - https://medium.com/@EqualityLabs/anti-doxing-guide-for-activists-facing-attacks-from-the-alt-right-ec6c290f543c

  • GrandAyatollaLenin [he/him,comrade/them]12•3 years ago

    Even if you don't care about security, the mystery can be fun.

    On another forum, people would often assume I was an old Russian dude because of the way I talked about communism. Others assmed I was British because of the spelling and punctuation I used.

    It never got old seeing how wrong they could be.

    • ToastGhost [he/him]5•3 years ago

      I wouldnt put your name into the search of a site like that ever. They may use the fact that the name was searched to solidify their suspicion of a person. Because the person searching is either its a naive leftist who wants to see if their own namr is on the list, or a fascist who wants to see all the dirt on a supposed leftist. In either case its probably enough proof for them that any name searched is a "leftist" in the eyes of fascists. So theyll publish your name up there for harassment and further doxxing.

    • thefunkycomitatus [he/him,they/them]13•3 years ago

      I don't use insta so idk. Google lets you download your data, but I'm not sure on deleting it. Your google account setting has options for collecting data for ads and personalization.

      It's one thing to talk about preventing doxxing in terms of right wingers or whatever. It's another to talk about preventing Big Data from knowing who you are. I'm not a professional but my opinion is that you can't stop the CIA/FBI/Google/Amazon/etc from knowing who you are and what you do.

      For adblocking and stuff: https://saidit.net/s/freemediaheckyeah/wiki/adblock-vpn-privacy

      For getting away from Big Data: https://prism-break.org/en/

        • Pirate [none/use name]3•3 years ago

          I'm pretty sure the companies will still have the data but maybe make a post in c/technology if you are looking for a tool to delete all of your posts.

    • mayo_cider [he/him]1•3 years ago

      If you live in EU, look into right to be forgotten. This is not 100% certain way to scrub everything (there's no way to make sure what data they will retain), but at least you'll have some kind of legal leg to stand on.

    • wantonviolins [they/them]4•3 years ago

      Seconding Bitwarden, you can even host it yourself if you’re into that sort of thing.

  • Wmill [he/him,use name]7•3 years ago

    Mfw I never posted before this chapo account and just scrubbed the only detail that would give my location away 🤓 . Edit also not yellow and don't wear glasses btw

  • comi [he/him]6•3 years ago

    Also think about probabilities, either you change accounts as suggested or carefully think how small tidbits of info narrow down to you from 8 billion people. Like saying I worked in fast food narrows you down to tens of millions, your current field to millions (by itself), university degree field to hundred thousands, all this taken together can point to 10-100 of people already out of billions. Something like your city will pinpoint you to couple of people after that. So if you have slightly rare (even you precise age) info either obfuscate or burn account after 3-5 such tidbits.

    Edit: If you have linkedin/public social, that’s available for anyone to do, otherwise only government agency/google have info counterpart for such narrowing down