OK so we probably all know about AOLs recent boo-boo when they inadvertently released search data pertaining to over 650,000 users. Just how serious is this though? What potential problems or embarressments may it cause for any users which might have searched for their personal names, addresses, social security number or other private information which might cause them to be identified? TJ McIntyre is a lecturer in the School of Law in UCD (University College Dublin) and has authored three very interesting posts on this very high profile incident on his blog ‘IT Law in Ireland’ which is located at http://www.tjmcintyre.com/.
In one of his posts TJ refers to the NY Times which ran a story about 62 year old Thelma Arnold who was ‘traced’ because of her detailed search queries. “My goodness, it’s my whole personal life,” she said. “I had no idea somebody was looking over my shoulder.” Thelma Arnold though wasn’t searching for anything too strange, things like ‘60 single men’ and ‘dog that urinates on everything’ where among her somewhat embarrassing searches. If others are indentified their searches may not be so harmless as queries such as ‘how to secretly poison your ex’ and ‘how to kill a wife’ are to be found among the massive 2GB of data which was released.
A lot of people are extremely annoyed with AOL over this and thus calls for an AOL boycott are widespread. Anyhow check out these posts, I found them very interesting.