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My dad called me in a panic last week. "Have you heard of that spoke-o-dot-com website? HAVE YOU HEARD?" The fact that my calm and collected father seemed panicked about something was alarming enough. The fact that he knew something about tech news as he is decidedly un-tech was even more alarming. But, yes, I had heard of Spokeo.com, and I was concerned about the level of information the search-engine-info-aggregator was sharing with the Web.
If you're unfamiliar with the site, spokeo.com is a data aggregator of all of your information. The site boasts the tagline "not your grandma's phonebook," and they get points for honesty. A phone book lists your name and address. Spokeo.com lists the worth of your home, its square footage, whether or not you're registered to vote (and for what party), your religious views, and your "wealth info." Among other things. Swell.
My dad gets mad props for tech-knowledge from me, because I had only become aware of the site earlier in the week thanks to repeated posts on Facebook. The status message my friends were sharing read like so:
There’s a site called spokeo.com that’s a new online USA phone book w/personal information: everything from pics you’ve posted on FB or web, your approx credit score, pics of where you live, income, age. Remove yourself by searching your name, copy the URL and then go to the bottom of the page and click on the Privacy link to remove yourself.
When I looked myself up, I found not only the listing for my Given-First-Name and Married-Last Name but also the First-Name-I-Go-By and Married-Last-Name, Given-First-Name and Maiden-Name, and lastly, First-Name-I-Go-By and Maiden-Name. I had multiple address listings for most of those names. My husband only had two: our current home and his college apartment. I followed the steps that Spokeo.com lists for removing yourself, though I ran into an error in that it only lets you delete two profiles per email address. Thankfully I have about a dozen email addresses due to work. And then the site eventually blocked me before I could remove my parents' information, claiming I had done too many removals in one day. Swell again.
I took advantage of the fact that I couldn't remove my parents information for them and decided to purchase a three month account to see what all the hoopla was about. The site recently moved all of the once-public information behind a paywall due to complaints.
Turns out, I'm not really all that worried about what the site is sharing... as most of it is wrong. My parents names, addresses, and general information were correct. However, there were huge discrepancies in information about their house. From my mom's profile to my dad's profile there was a $600,000 difference in their home worth. The Google map also showing where they lived was wrong though their address was right. My mom's only interests listed are that she "enjoys shopping," which she does, and that she "orders from mail catalogs" (again, she does). My dad apparently "plays sports" (uh, maybe one golf game per year), "enjoys food and wine" (food, yes; wine, uh, no) and "browses mail catalogs" (if they mean "complains that his wife leaves mail catalogs all over the house," well then, maybe). Also, spokeo says that it is unknown if my dad is registered to vote; he is.
As a note, none of the photos my mom has shared on Facebook have made it to her spokeo.com profile like the Facebook status update warning states. My dad doesn't even have a Facebook account, so he's safe there too.
I have since removed my parents' profiles and they can finally breathe again. But the question remains: Does spokeo.com warrant a freak-out?
The Better Business Bureau says no. In a blog post, they explained that the information being shared is public record, and the stuff that isn't is the stuff we're sharing online anyway.
So while you can delete your individual listing in the “Privacy form” on Spokeo’s website, just removing your search results won’t stop people from accessing your data by other means. If you don’t like your information showing up to ex-spouses, potential bosses, bill collectors, and the curious masses, don’t provide it to social networking sites. If you do, make sure your privacy settings are tuned to the highest possible level. And do realize that since we live in the Information Age, some information is public record, like real
