Your Devices Can Expose You...NOT Protect You - Jeffrey's Story

    Jeffrey’s a close friend. A “type A” extrovert who loves the Internet and stories of successful people who drop out of school. He gravitated towards real estate after dropping out of college, using a private loan rather than a mortgage to get started.

    One day, Jeffrey saw a tag in his social media profile. When he followed the link, he saw that someone was posting videos about him! It turns out, it was one of his tenants, in front of a local courthouse ranting about how they shouldn’t have to pay rent. The tenant also posted his personal information: phone number and home address.
Jeffrey had a panic attack. He felt violated and vulnerable.

    “The next few days are going to be rough,” he thought to himself.

    When I caught up with Jeffrey, I immediately felt for the guy. Knowing he was a “type A”, I wanted to give him a more “extreme” option, or as close to it as I could get. Though I wouldn’t recommend this approach for most people, I knew Jeff has the discipline to stick with things for the long term.

    We had to start, like always, with his personal information. I knew Jeffrey was pretty tech savvy, and if he didn’t know, he made an effort to learn. He knew a little bit about “people search” sites and public records. But Jeff wanted to be as “invisible” as he can. So we needed to focus on the most significant single point of failure: his cell phone. After all, that was the number that his tenant posted...the one that ended up on the Internet without him realizing it.

    Then, we secured the rest of his devices, working on some privacy techniques while online, and even offline, like when you have to give out information at a meeting. He secured his devices and changed his habits, and that gave him the feeling of privacy and security he wanted.

    Now, Jeffrey feel like a weight has been lifted off him. He feels more secure than ever.

    “It’s almost like a superpower,” he once told me.

    When Jeff does anything online now, he has a very calm feeling knowing that if he did become the target of another slanderous attack, there wouldn’t be anything about him to reveal this time. He made it very difficult for all but the most motivated people to find him and his stuff.

    When you use proper privacy practices, and secure your devices, you make it very difficult for someone to find you. It makes them question if it’s worth the effort, time or resources. Jeffrey was the victim of a “dox” attack: where you find personal information, and reveal it online for all to see.

Names have been changed to protect privacy.