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Boards.ie email address issue July 2021

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12357…12

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    #122
    Wibbs
    Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 60,144 Mod ✭✭✭✭Wibbs


    https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117700436#Comment_117700436

    Kinda, but the legalese part is small fry IMHO. What's much more at stake are the optics to users. If people think they've been exposed that adds to the growing reasons to walk away.

    Rejoice in the awareness of feeling stupid, for that’s how you end up learning new things. If you’re not aware you’re stupid, you probably are.



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    #123
    Leg End Reject
    Registered Users Posts: 16,877 ✭✭✭✭Leg End Reject


    Has anyone informed the affected users that their email was visible before @Mickeroo flicked the switch, and that it's still visible on Google?

    We're all talking about it here and we know 3 of the affected usernames, so they have a right to know.

    https://forumofgames.com/index.php




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    #124
    Signore Fancy Pants
    Registered Users Posts: 3,686 ✭✭✭Signore Fancy Pants


    https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117700489#Comment_117700489

    Yeah, lads those earlier screenshots need to go.

    While PERSEC is every individuals responsibility, anyone with any rudimentary OSINT abilities can yield way too much information on someone. For example, without going down the rabbit hole, I have one users name, location, email, Youtube channel and plenty more if I spent a few minutes at it...which I obviously won't.

    Not good at all.



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    #125
    Leg End Reject
    Registered Users Posts: 16,877 ✭✭✭✭Leg End Reject


    https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117700845#Comment_117700845

    Jesus! We're past the stage where "Nothing to see here" is acceptable @Boards.ie: Odhran.

    https://forumofgames.com/index.php




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    #126
    SouthWesterly
    Registered Users Posts: 6,692 ✭✭✭SouthWesterly


    Just searched my profile and its private.

    For those dismissing the DPC. Substantial fines could be handed out depending on the size of of a breach. Boards will have to determine that and decide whether it needs to be reported.


    Others can of course report a breach of their data to the DPC who will then see a common thread. They will of course need proof your data is breached.



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    #127
    Boards.ie: Niamh
    Boards.ie Employee Posts: 12,597 ✭✭✭✭✭Boards.ie: Niamh
    Boards.ie Community Manager


    Hi all, thanks for your patience. We have confirmed that the option to 'Allow other users to see your email?' was OFF for all users on migration.

    Since then a small number of users have ticked this box to allow their email address be seen by others. We will be switching this back to OFF for these users as well and contacting them to let them know the implications of switching it on.

    Re being able to Google a user and see their email address, this was possible due to an error in permissions for logged out users meaning that they could see email addresses on accounts which had enabled the 'Allow other users to see your email?' option. This permission has been removed now, however Google results are not updated instantaneously so it will take time for those results to disappear. We really do apologise for this and will convey our apologies to the users who have the option enabled directly as well. If anyone has turned it off recently, please accept our apologies here.

    We will be contacting the DPC tomorrow to make them aware of the issue.

    On another note, for the sake of your fellow users, please don't google and share particular users info here; even by showing their username in a screenshot you are leading others to their email address. We can request Google remove these results quicker but they don't always respond to these requests.

    The team are already aware of and working on a solution for the issue with closed accounts but thanks for letting us know again here.

    Again, thanks to you all for making us aware of this so we could get it fixed, we sincerely apologise to those affected.


    Tl;dr a setting to allow unregistered/logged out users see everything a logged in user was set which allowed the email addresses of those who selected to show their emails to be seen from outside of the site. This has now been rectified though Google search results may take a while longer to update.

    How can I? User's guide to some features on the new site



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    #128
    seamus
    Registered Users Posts: 68,317 ✭✭✭✭seamus


    https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117701008#Comment_117701008
    https://howmanycompanieshasthedpcfined.ie/

    Theory -v- practice.



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    #129
    SouthWesterly
    Registered Users Posts: 6,692 ✭✭✭SouthWesterly


    https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117701103#Comment_117701103

    Niamh, This email needs to be a forum wide announcement rather than a post hidden away in a long... ish thread.

    Great that you've found the problem though sadly it points back to a severe lack of testing before the new platform went live.



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    #130
    SouthWesterly
    Registered Users Posts: 6,692 ✭✭✭SouthWesterly


    https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117701242#Comment_117701242

    Based on boards contacting the DPC tomorrow, we shall soon see.



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    #131
    salonfire
    Registered Users Posts: 3,078 ✭✭✭salonfire


    https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117701919#Comment_117701919

    Why? It was users' own choice to make their email public by ticking the checkbox in their Profile. Consent was given.



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    #132
    Shield
    Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators, Help & Feedback Category Moderators Posts: 9,818 CMod ✭✭✭✭Shield


    https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117702193#Comment_117702193

    It was users’ choice to make their email public to “other members”, not to unregistered users which included Google. That’s what the problem is. Everybody with internet access could see the email addresses, member or not.



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    #133
    Jeff2
    Registered Users Posts: 7,064 ✭✭✭Jeff2


    https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117702193#Comment_117702193

    Consent given for the site not outside.



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    #134
    Fr_Dougal
    Registered Users Posts: 9,167 ✭✭✭Fr_Dougal


    @Boards.ie: Niamh perhaps you would be kind enough to change the thread title back to its original, correct title.



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    #135
    Jeff2
    Registered Users Posts: 7,064 ✭✭✭Jeff2


    It's likely some users use same email as Facebook

    There is actually potential for someone to get the phone number of a person if they have that open on Facebook.



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    #136
    TheChizler
    Registered Users Posts: 9,448 ✭✭✭TheChizler


    https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117702229#Comment_117702229

    That's exactly what I would have expected, that anything visible on a profile wouldn't require a membership to view, same as our posts. Kinda surprised that's not the general expectation. Of course they could have made that clear though.



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    #137
    salonfire
    Registered Users Posts: 3,078 ✭✭✭salonfire


    Yeah but really is whoever makes it visible to Boards really bothered about it being made visible to Google as well?

    In what scenario would someone be comfortable having their email address visible to the 600,000 users of Boards but concerned about anyone outside that.

    Mountain out of a molehill.



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    #138
    MrMusician18
    Registered Users Posts: 7,342 ✭✭✭MrMusician18


    https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117702488#Comment_117702488

    It's more visible to scraping algorithms if you do not need an account. It also means that now this is public knowledge, this info will be hanging out there for weeks until the Google cache is renewed.



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    #139
    Fr_Dougal
    Registered Users Posts: 9,167 ✭✭✭Fr_Dougal


    https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117702488#Comment_117702488

    600,000 users of boards. 🤣



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    #140
    Leg End Reject
    Registered Users Posts: 16,877 ✭✭✭✭Leg End Reject


    https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117702514#Comment_117702514
    https://giphy.com/gifs/StKcfTc8pKg0w

    "Active" vs "Inactive" 🤣

    https://forumofgames.com/index.php




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    #141
    Leg End Reject
    Registered Users Posts: 16,877 ✭✭✭✭Leg End Reject


    https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117701103#Comment_117701103

    Niamh, the screenshots are still on page 2.

    https://forumofgames.com/index.php




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    #142
    Shield
    Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators, Help & Feedback Category Moderators Posts: 9,818 CMod ✭✭✭✭Shield


    D51104D2-59BA-435F-A16F-6ED212942E16.jpeg

    ”The 600,000 users of Boards… are they in the room with us now?”



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    #143
    fritzelly
    Registered Users Posts: 17,448 ✭✭✭✭fritzelly


    https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117702661#Comment_117702661


    I now know what youtube channel you follow and now will find out everything about your life



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    #144
    NorthCity
    Registered Users Posts: 216 ✭✭NorthCity


    I think I am the only one who has a throw away email address specifically for Boards . If it's made public I won't lose any sleep . Start changing your email addresses, it might change in earlier posts also and break the connection to you . Worth a try .



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    #145
    Signore Fancy Pants
    Registered Users Posts: 3,686 ✭✭✭Signore Fancy Pants


    https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117702488#Comment_117702488

    This is a mind-boggling idiotic statement. You clearly don't understand the amount of harm a nefarious individual could do with even basic information.

    In this instance, a member here did not use a burner email and while it may not be their primary email, a significant amount of information on them is available with only a cursory first layer search.

    Obviously if the information was in respect to you, you'd be quite happy with me (a stranger on the internet) knowing your real name, where you live, your interests etc.

    Just for this guy alone, I have ample unreasonable opportunity to engage in various degrees of online and real life harassment, blackmail and cultivation....and that's the mild end of issues where the best you could hope for is ONLY being doxxed.

    There's a vast amount of unhinged individuals among us, maybe one of them disagreed with the poster and now wants to confront them in real life, well now they can.

    Mountain out of a molehill my bollox, you'd want to switch yourself on and not be so dismissive over something you are clearly uneducated about.

    Opting in to allow fellow users to contact a burner address, fair enough, not for me but fair enough. Having it available to any fcuktard on Google. No way.

    In my opinion, there should never be an option to allow the viewing of your personal details on here, not all of us use burner emails/phone numbers and not all of us understand what can be done with that information.



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    #146
    [Deleted User]
    Posts: 0 ✭ [Deleted User]


    I came across this thread only because somebody mentioned it in another thread. @Boards.ie: Niamh you really need to let the entire site know to check their settings. I wasn’t sure mine was checked or unchecked until went to look just now

    Remember the day the site reopened? Absolutely everything was white and very confusing. This included the profile area and I do remember looking at the email section wondering was my email address showing or not showing. Another poster PMed me asking me to check theirs as they wasn’t sure either.

    It’s highly probable that some users checked the email box in error and they are none the wiser. The least you could do is have a site wide notice banner saying “check your email settings in your profile”



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    #147
    [Deleted User]
    Posts: 0 ✭ [Deleted User]


    Ask the members who were randomly selected here for test searches had they checked their email visibility boxes by deliberate choice.


    My memory is different re what is said to have been default settings but that could easily be me and I have to accept what is said. But directly ask others who have been proven to have had email visibility and it should help clear some things up.


    Posters hand waving data privacy issues really should give themselves a shake.



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    #148
    [Deleted User]
    Posts: 17,378 ✭✭✭✭ [Deleted User]


    Fact is that if the email is searchable on Google, that is an incredible breach. What if that's what you're applying for jobs with etc. and an employer can see everything you've posted.



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    #149
    shanec1928
    Registered Users Posts: 4,143 ✭✭✭shanec1928


    https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117701103#Comment_117701103

    So you will re amend the thread title back to what it was before you changed it. a data breach not a email issue.



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    #150
    Mickeroo
    Administrators, Computer Games Moderators, Sports Moderators Posts: 32,228 Admin ✭✭✭✭✭Mickeroo


    https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117702589#Comment_117702589

    Thanks, I removed them there.



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    #151
    salonfire
    Registered Users Posts: 3,078 ✭✭✭salonfire


    https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117702927#Comment_117702927

    I wouldn't want you or anyone else knowing my email address. Hence I did not tick the checkbox. But that's not what happened here is it? People knowingly made their email public.


    I assume you did not give your email when signing up for the HSE vaccine either if you're so precious about it. Afterall, they already had their data compromised.



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