AOL User Positively ID’d Based On Search History

By consumerist.com August 9, 2006

NYT matched user 4417749 to Thelma Arnold, 62, of Lilburn, Ga.

Her searches included “numb fingers,” “60 single men” and “dog that urinates on everything.”

    “Those are my searches,” she said, after a reporter read part of the list to her.”

You can tell the NYT editor’s directives were “Ok, ID someone but make sure their results are totally innocuous, you know, fit to print.”

(Thanks to Andrew!)

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Comments

  1. GilloD says:
    November 30, -0001 at 12:00 am

    Wait. What? Why would we do this?! The leak is bad enough, encouraging people to metaphorically sift through their neighbor’s garbage for inccriminating evidence is worse.

  2. YourTechSupport says:
    November 30, -0001 at 12:00 am

    Damn. I was like 40 seconds away from sending this in…

    I wonder who else well end up with a number on them in the coming months.

  3. Daniel Rutter says:
    November 30, -0001 at 12:00 am

    This post has been up for, oh, minutes now, and there still hasn’t been one grandma-gangbang joke made.

    I’m very disappointed by you all.

  4. saneforla says:
    November 30, -0001 at 12:00 am

    poor thing also says she plans on cancelling her aol account. good luck with that.

  5. Zach Everson says:
    November 30, -0001 at 12:00 am

    I love that last line too:

    In response, she plans to drop her AOL subscription. “We all have a right to privacy,” she said. “Nobody should have found this all out.”

    Saneforla–hopefully the reporters have already pitched her forthcoming problems to their editor as a follow-up!

  6. Paul D says:
    November 30, -0001 at 12:00 am

    grandma gangbang.


    hahahahahahohohohohoheeheeheehee…

  7. Pelagius says:
    November 30, -0001 at 12:00 am

    Asked about Ms. Arnold, an AOL spokesman, Andrew
    Weinstein, reiterated the company’s position that the data release was
    a mistake. “We apologize specifically to her,” he said. “There is not a whole lot we can do.”

    Yes, there bloody well is! And I’m sure a good lawyer could provide some ideas.

  8. saneforla says:
    November 30, -0001 at 12:00 am

    every writer in l.a. must be a little concerned right about now. can you imagine the search terms used researching that new “nip/tuck” spec!