Trident University

Joshua Roberts

Module 2 Session Long Assignment

Course Number: ITM434 : Bus. Ethics and Soc. Issues in Cmptng

Dr. Donald Reinhart

February 7, 2011
 I’m lucky enough to have a common name where if you put it Google it is so many

people with the same name that it is almost impossible to find me. The problem is the 123people

website. I almost was alarmed by the information that they list without if digging deep. It told

all the past locations where I lived, my parents, and if you really want to pay up you can out my

background and practically anything else you want to know about me.

I have to admit that this class opens my eyes to some things. I have been married for 5

years now, and I have an interesting story dealing with my ex probably because she used this

site. I’ll try to make it short but I feel you may find this a little interesting. When I joined the

Marines I was dating a woman and after I got to my first duty station we lost touch. During my

four year tour I met my lovely wife, and the other woman I had nothing else to do with her. I

assumed that she understood that and everything is good.

One day I guess she decides to do a check on me and found out I was married and had a

child as well which pushed her overboard. She took the time to make a fake Facebook profile

with a picture of me and then sent a friend request to my wife. When she called me to her laptop

she asked me if I knew someone by the name of Jessica, and I said no, that’s when she showed

me the profile of this “Jessica” with this huge picture of me. When I seen the picture I had an

idea it was the ex who was doing this. My wife accepted the friend request and immediately

upon accepting the invite she started saying that while I was dating my wife I was also dating

this “Jessica” girl. I’m sure you can imagine how awkward and stressing this situation was.

Explaining to my wife that I had no idea who she was I had her tell “Jessica” to send a picture of

herself to my email.

She sent the email and of course I tracked down the ip address (thank goodness I learned

that from AT&T talk about more privacy being exploited) and it traced it right back to my
hometown. That was probably the only thing that saved me from things turning sour. I had

always wondered how she tracked me down. To this day she still manages to find ways to get in

contact with me. I have changed my number and moved to a new address and she sent me an

email and a text a couple of months ago.

I’m assuming that this had to be through a website such as 123people.com. What bothers

me about that is unstable people, your enemies, or even worse can find you by using this service.

I feel it is almost unfair that someone else can know more about me than I know. When you said

it was scary to see that this story immediately popped up in my mind.