Haven't been stalked, per se, though I've had a few annoying people latch onto me and keep bugging me until I had to Ignore them or designate their e-mail spam.
I did hook up with a guy I met online several years ago. I consider it my good fortune that he lived in another state, so when I figured out that he wasn't very good for me, it was a fairly simple matter to sever contact (though I imagine he could find me again easily enough if he really wanted to.)
My personal safety rules for the Internet:
1. Stay out of chat rooms. I suspect this is the single biggest thing you can do to keep yourself safe. The only chat-style environment I frequent is a semiprivate MUSH where I meet a group of trusted people once every two weeks or so for an RPG. I'm on several different IM services, but I only turn them on when I need to get hold of someone, and I only accept IM's from people on my friends lists.
2. Don't frequent porn sites (not talking fanfic so much, I mean "traditional" or mainstream porn) or if you do, use throwaway e-mail addresses and user accounts.
3. Go here to get a scrambled version of your e-mail address:
http://www.siteup.com/encoder.html
Use it on any web pages you have and in any place where your e-mail address will be publicly visible--both for visible text and links. Humans will be able to read it and click on it, automatic address harvesters will not. And check the "Scramble my e-mail address" option in LJ if you choose to make your addy public!
4. Run your name and address, SSN, and other important info that you don't want people to have through a Google search once in a while. Investigate any sites that turn up with this information, and contact them with a removal request if they've got too much of your info too readily available. (Note, make sure before you do this that you're running an up to date firewall and an antivirus program so nobody can swipe your info when you enter it into Google!)
5. Don't give out your last name online, or your first name either, if it's rare or unusual. Don't be too specific about location information. There's a point of diminishing returns, I think--I'll tell people the general part of my state that I live in, but not my city.
6. Absolutely do not give out your phone number or street address publicly, and think twice before you send it to anyone via e-mail. I won't say never, ever, ever give them to anyone under any circumstances, but apply some common sense; wait until you've corresponded with someone for some time, do a little checking into them online, and trust your gut instinct if it tells you not to share that info.
7. If you're being stalked, contact CyberAngels:
http://www.cyberangels.org/
They're staffed by volunteers from all over the Internet who are trained to help. Their site also has useful net safety information.
8. Software security can overlap into the realm of online personal safety, so here's a list of links to freeware security programs to keep your machine free of viruses, trojans, keystroke loggers, and other nefarious unwanted programs:
no subject
Haven't been stalked, per se, though I've had a few annoying people latch onto me and keep bugging me until I had to Ignore them or designate their e-mail spam.
I did hook up with a guy I met online several years ago. I consider it my good fortune that he lived in another state, so when I figured out that he wasn't very good for me, it was a fairly simple matter to sever contact (though I imagine he could find me again easily enough if he really wanted to.)
My personal safety rules for the Internet:
1. Stay out of chat rooms. I suspect this is the single biggest thing you can do to keep yourself safe. The only chat-style environment I frequent is a semiprivate MUSH where I meet a group of trusted people once every two weeks or so for an RPG. I'm on several different IM services, but I only turn them on when I need to get hold of someone, and I only accept IM's from people on my friends lists.
2. Don't frequent porn sites (not talking fanfic so much, I mean "traditional" or mainstream porn) or if you do, use throwaway e-mail addresses and user accounts.
3. Go here to get a scrambled version of your e-mail address:
http://www.siteup.com/encoder.html
Use it on any web pages you have and in any place where your e-mail address will be publicly visible--both for visible text and links. Humans will be able to read it and click on it, automatic address harvesters will not. And check the "Scramble my e-mail address" option in LJ if you choose to make your addy public!
4. Run your name and address, SSN, and other important info that you don't want people to have through a Google search once in a while. Investigate any sites that turn up with this information, and contact them with a removal request if they've got too much of your info too readily available. (Note, make sure before you do this that you're running an up to date firewall and an antivirus program so nobody can swipe your info when you enter it into Google!)
5. Don't give out your last name online, or your first name either, if it's rare or unusual. Don't be too specific about location information. There's a point of diminishing returns, I think--I'll tell people the general part of my state that I live in, but not my city.
6. Absolutely do not give out your phone number or street address publicly, and think twice before you send it to anyone via e-mail. I won't say never, ever, ever give them to anyone under any circumstances, but apply some common sense; wait until you've corresponded with someone for some time, do a little checking into them online, and trust your gut instinct if it tells you not to share that info.
7. If you're being stalked, contact CyberAngels:
http://www.cyberangels.org/
They're staffed by volunteers from all over the Internet who are trained to help. Their site also has useful net safety information.
8. Software security can overlap into the realm of online personal safety, so here's a list of links to freeware security programs to keep your machine free of viruses, trojans, keystroke loggers, and other nefarious unwanted programs:
http://www.livejournal.com/users/amberdiceless/29652.html