On this era with Facebook, MySpace, and other Web 2.0 stuffs, do you feel that you are losing your privacy (and security) bit by bit?
I was activating my new credit card today through the phone (it’s meant to expire soon, so they sent me a new card to be renewed) and realized that the bank uses my date of birth to confirm my identity.
Only the date of birth? That’s…. scary.
Why is it scary?
Well have you realized so far, that you have filled in some online (and offline) forms with your date of birth? When you register to a web service, a forum, or whatever that is, did you remember filling in your real date of birth on the form? Not to mention that you have these social sites like MySpace, Facebook, and Friendster who’ll gladly tell the whole world your own security password (a.k.a your date of birth?). It’s true that you can limit who can see your date of birth, but how far do you trust your childhood friends whom you haven’t seen for 20 years? Or what can limit them from telling other people what your date of birth is?
Some services also have secret questions (in which hopefully you are the only one who knows about the answer) but some others are still using date of birth as a mere tool to identify you being the real you.
After this incident, I don’t think I’ll ever write my real date of birth again when I register to web services… Am I just being paranoid or someone else has realized this too?
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