What is Doxing? Doxing is a method of using the information people put on their profiles or accounts to find who they are in the real world. A very good example of this is the cyber bullying of Jessi Slaughter. She was doxed to an extreme extent and her information was all put on the internet to be used. The Information that a doxer would be looking for, and the sort of information that was found about her, would be things such as:
§ First and last name
§ Phone number(s)
§ Email addresses
§ Social networking profiles (e.g. Facebook,orkut,etc)
§ Mailing address
§ Relatives/Family
It is alarmingly easy to find all of this information for a large percentage of internet users. Once a malicious doxer has all of this he or she could use that information to do a number of harmful pranks. If they have enough information they could use it to answer security questions on any of a victims internet accounts. Eg: Mothers maiden name, pets name, etc. On the malicious prank side of things here are a few examples:
· Signing you up for online dating sites
- This would result in random lonely people calling you looking for dates.
· Signing you up to receive spam
- There are some websites out there that will enter an address in to the sending list for all sorts of junk mail.
· Box Flooding
- Ordering hundreds of boxes in your name to flood your yard with them
· Fast Food
- Some fast food stores offer online ordering, people can order pizza or another food in your name to be delivered to your house, which you then have to pay for.
That is just the standard set of pranks, people are bound to keep thinking of new ways to make your life harder. If you made a serious enemy on the internet the person doxing you may not just be out to send you fast food. Stalkers and other less than wanted visitors could use information from a dox to find where you live and work in real life, and possibly come there themselves.
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