I’ve tried to stay away from all the data mining of weirdos using the database AOL Research released not too long ago.� I really tried to forget about the stupid mistake AOL made but it’s impossible when you have AOL users searching for “screwing old womens feet” and “cum on grannys feet.”� ewwwwww….

Stalking user #1030784

Here’s another one.� An AOL user searches for “purchase beastiality dvds” “cum fill women with horses” “florida food handler’s course” “osceola county florida” “hot dog carts.”� There’s way more but if you run into a guy running a hot dog cart in Osceola County Florida then I’d think twice about purchasing that hot dog… unless you’re into that kind of stuff then it might be a great conversation starter… heh

Stalking user #597555

I love this stuff. I wanted to blog about this yesterday but held off. AOL will be one of many companies who’s mistakes will cost them the users’ trust and a hell of a lot of money. I just recently blogged about AOL and they’re “big mistake” when the news first went main stream. In that post I mentioned how juicy this news will be to every net user. Well, I didn’t think it would really be this bad. Yesterday, the New York Times released an article: A Face Is Exposed for AOL Searcher No. 4417749 and it talks about locating a 62 year old woman out of the 20 million search query database that AOL released. Let me tell ya… this will be one of many folks who will be located by AOL’s mistake.

Here’s a pretty good exerpt from their post:

And search by search, click by click, the identity of AOL user No. 4417749 became easier to discern. There are queries for �landscapers in Lilburn, Ga,� several people with the last name Arnold and �homes sold in shadow lake subdivision gwinnett county georgia.�

It did not take much investigating to follow that data trail to Thelma Arnold, a 62-year-old widow who lives in Lilburn, Ga., frequently researches her friends� medical ailments and loves her three dogs. �Those are my searches,� she said, after a reporter read part of the list to her.

And another one of a quote from AOL spokesman, Andrew Weinstein:

�We apologize specifically to her,� he said. �There is not a whole lot we can do.�

Give me a freakin break. There’s nothing you can do? How about compensation? She’s 62 years old for God sakes. Money works for most people…

The very last paragraph of the NYT article goes like this:

Ms. Arnold says she loves online research, but the disclosure of her searches has left her disillusioned. 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.�

Well, good for you Ms. Arnold. Do your searches through Google for now on. Google works off of trust with their users. Oh and by the way… Do you need a Gmail invite??? *chuckles*

I seriously can not understand the stupidity of AOL Research releasing this type of information. Everyone at work asks me why I love Google so much and all I do is tell them to read the news. It’s right in front of your face. Google puts a lot of time and money into protecting their users’ privacy while companies as AOL hand it out for free. Of course there are more reasons why I prefer Google over any other search engine but need I go any further?….

Here are some related external blog posts:

• AOL’s disturbing glimpse into users’ lives
• AOL Releases Search Data & Raises Privacy Concerns
• AOL Privacy: chai tea calories/aftermath of incest

The millions of dollars other companies put into protecting our privacy as consumers while AOL just hands out their data for free to the general public. I personally don’t like a lot of posts at Techcrunch where Michael Arrington writes what he feels but this one I totally agree with and I’m sure millions of other consumers out there will also. Talk about screwing your whole business in the name of research and handing out private info without permission from their own users. How despicable.

While reading through this article from the AOL Research blog I came across a couple of hurtful comments that sent a chill down my spine. Like this one:

12:09 by lando?: Hmm, i find it fascinating that user 545605’s searches are “shore hills park mays landing nj”, “frank william sindoni md”, “ceramic ashtrays”, “transfer money to china”, and “capital gains on sale of house”. I wonder how Mr. Frank William in Sindoni, Maryland will feel about being included in your publicized data.

Ouch!

and:

20:49 by anonymous: Simply replacing usernames doesn’t make this anonymous. You dolts. (Although thanks for the massive data set to play with)

Not as bad as the first but I’m sure more will show up soon. I would say something like “let’s boycott AOL” but I’ve never been an AOL user unless you count AIM. AOL email is the worst big name online email client ever created but for some reason I keep checking in to see if there might have been a change recently but I”ve always been disappointed. Oh well. *sigh*

This is some juicy news and I can’t wait until it’s all over the net Monday morning. Till then…

Update: Right after posting this article I noticed that the blog post on the AOL Research blog has been taken down. Even the direct download link for the data file has been cut off. I’m not sure if it was because they couldn’t handle the vast amount of downloads (which I doubt) or an AOL Exec was woken up on this quiet Sunday afternoon to a crowd of protesters outside his mansion. I’ll keep checking…. heh

Update: Google cache link to the removed AOL blog post: http://72.14.207.104/search?q=cache:2Qvd2z9VbuIJ:research.aol.com/pmwiki/pmwiki.php%3Fn%3DResearch.500kUserQueriesSampledOver3Months+&hl=en&gl=us&ct=clnk&cd=1

P.S. And you all thought I was nuts for wearing a tinfoil hat.