Blogging and personal security

July 8 2003

A blog reader pinged me last night and said, "do you ever worry about the fact that your blog basically advertises when you are going to be away from your home?"
Actually, yes.  I was just thinking about this over the weekend, as I made plans for an upcoming vacation (as opposed to business travel to interesting places).  Y'all know when I am away, just by reading my schedule or the location field on my postings. Thus, by definition, you know when I'm not in my home.  We all do it -- Volker is in Berlin, Rob is travelling the country, Libby has five upcoming trips, Steve is commuting 200 miles a day.  Nobody's home.
Just authoring on this topic makes me a little uncomfortable....though, like any discussion about security, the bad guys have probably thought of this stuff already.  It is thus naive not to discuss it, like you'll give someone an idea.
So the question is, what do you do?  I started this weblog in part because I wanted to be able to write about business travel.  That means my home and family are exposed to some possible risk.  Now, the bad guys don't necessarily know that my home or family are more vulnerable just because I'm away ... maybe I have a cousin on the police force in Highland Park (well, my wife does), maybe my in-laws come by every day (pretty sure they do when I am away), and maybe the home security system is certainly on more often than when I'm here.  Or maybe not.  That's all good when it's just me travelling.  What about if we're all away?
One decision I made in this area is that I'm not posting exact dates or where I'm going for vacation (Heck, I might just be going to Milwaukee on a day trip, and weeding the garden for the rest of the week, right???? :). Might write about it after the fact, not before.  I can/could also take advantage of the DominoBlog feature that lets you author blogs in advance and have them magically appear on a specified date, but then I'm not here to participate in the discussions about those blogs (though with web access quickly becoming incredibly ubiquitous, that might not be much of an issue anymore).   Or I could stop posting the "upcoming events" and stop using the location field on the blog.
Interesting thoughts and challenges.  I tried to google to see what other bloggers have written on this topic, but it was really hard to find the right search criteria.  Anyone have some good links or thoughts?

Ed Brill I’m not telling. Category: Add/View Comments [20]

Post a Comment

  1. 1  Gayle  | 7/8/2003 11:20:37 AM

    Pretty interesting topic and one that has left me to ponder as well. I'm not sure that posting your whereabouts on blogs create a real critical security issue, but it does leave one to be a bit more cautious. One area that I think people need to be more cautious about is what type of greeting they put on their personal phone messages at home. It really bugs me when I hear something like, "we're not home right now, but please leave me a message...." I say something more on the lines of "we can't come to the phone right now, so please leave your name, etc..." Just a matter of preference perhaps or maybe just my way of being cautious.

  1. 2  Libby http://www.notesgirl.com | 7/8/2003 11:50:38 AM

    Funny you should come up with this topic today -- I actually thought about this for the first time yesterday when I was posting my upcoming travels, especially since some of those will be both of us. Of course, Yogi the dog will still be here protecting our home and our kitties, but it did actually cross my mind. I think that the arguments against it being a real security rist are pretty cogent; however, it does seem that if you have any "local" readers that you might be at more risk. I know Chris, for example, is listed on the St. Louis bloggers site (it shows up in his referrers occasionally), so someone actually in his town could be checking. On the other hand, it does seem unlikely that a theif with that much technical interest would be interested in the house -- there are lots more interesting places to steal from than *my* house anyway (says a girl whose house *has* been robbed while she was away on vacation a few years ago)...

  1. 3  David Price  | 7/8/2003 12:57:50 PM

    I am more worried about my paper delivery person than someone scanning a blog. Unless you are the Turtle and describe your living arraignments in detail, a thief could not know that you live alone. Besides they would need to track back from your blog to your house. A thief with those skills is better off stealing identifies than risking a run in with an armed homeowner. Although in your case your wit could be as deadly.

  1. 4  John  | 7/8/2003 12:58:45 PM

  1. 5  Ed Brill http://www.edbrill.com | 7/12/2003 6:01:25 PM

    Sebastian Fiedler has picked this one up as well. He asks, " I kind of wonder what we gain from putting information like travelling schedules online? What are the benefits and the risks?"

    For me, I put my business travel schedule online so that customers and partners can find me. If I am going to be at an event, the event will likely be advertising my presentation anyway. The other travel leads to what Sam Ruby calls "manufactured serendipity", like my chance to meet Mike Werner (and maybe, uh, a friend of his) next week in Paris.

  1. 6  Tom Duff http://www.twduff.com | 7/8/2003 3:03:59 PM

    I don't travel all that much for it to be an issue, but I did have second thoughts when I posted that I will be at DisneyWorld last month. It was fairly easy to draw the conclusion it was a family vacation and that the house stood a reasonable chance of being empty. While anyone could find my address if they wanted to, it's not as if I have it posted right there on the blog.

    Bottom line... Something to think about when posting info on the blog, but I don't know that I'd change my habits over it.

  1. 7  vowe  | 7/8/2003 4:41:06 PM

    Come on, do you really believe it makes a difference, WHAT you say on a greeting message of your answering machine? That does not deter anyone. My best message was "Bla bla bla bla bla Volker Weber, bla bla bla bla, NOW". OK, every recording started with laughter but it worked. :-)

  1. 8  Bruce Elgort http://www.bruceelgort.com | 7/8/2003 4:57:36 PM

    Obviously you haven't heard Gayle's voice mail greeting. She gives good phone. ;-)

  1. 9  Gayle  | 7/8/2003 5:03:04 PM

    Why do you think I'm in Sales?! ;o)

  1. 10  domino-it.com admin http://www.domino-it.com | 7/8/2003 6:38:39 PM

    that's one of the reasons i keep my blog 'anonymous'. i'm sure you can find out who i am if you try hard enough but at least it's not advertised. anyway i think there too much personal information out there already; for every site you need to register nowadays and i'm sure like me you will also always try to use the same userid & password combination....this leaves a door open for people who want to be 'bad'.

  1. 11  vowe  | 7/9/2003 4:27:18 AM

    Picked up an interesting idea at Martin Roell's log: You install a WLAN access point. You do not encrypt it and declare a public access point. You may find a lot of people hanging around your house watching it around the clock.

  1. 12  Anonymous  | 7/9/2003 9:21:53 AM

    My blog was auto-magically added to a list of blogs for our city. A few days after adding a picture of our new puppy to the blog I noticed some new referrers apprearing in the logs. A trip to the site showed the ramblings of a 20 year old who hated puppies and had made some vague threats against the dog. Some quick checks confirmed he was also in our city. Even if I hadn't made the mistake of registering my domain name to my home address, my great state has property tax records on line.

  1. 13  Ben Langhinrichs http://www.GeniiSoft.com | 7/8/2003 1:20:42 AM

    I don't actually travel, except very rarely, but I guess I would use the same caution you do, only talking about the travel after the fact. The tough one is Lotusphere. Who doesn't know where most of us will be then, eh?

  1. 14  Michael Urspringer http://www.urspringer.de | 7/8/2003 2:52:20 AM

    Oops, you should NOT push the "Send" button before writing your text :-)

    Yes, Ed. I am asking me the same question about the travel information in my weblog. And I was asked by some friends about that too. I do not really have a solution but I hope the alarm system and my neighbours are on the alert and that would be enough. But I am interested what other bloggers think and I will discuss that on my web site, too.

  1. 15  Michael Urspringer http://www.urspringer.de | 7/8/2003 2:47:26 AM

  1. 16  Steve Castledine  | 7/8/2003 5:08:04 AM

    Maybe then our blog's should also contain pictures of the pack of alsation dogs roaming the premises, or a picture of the neighbours wife - or maybe just mention we use all microsoft software - so nothing worth stealing!

  1. 17  Mike Werner  | 7/8/2003 3:07:44 AM

    I really don't think that someone who is planning to burgle your house is going to check blogs to see when someone is not there. It's a lot easier to stand behind a tree and actually SEE that there's no one in the house.

    My only worry is that the new Status Indicator that Steve has put in the blog (on my request I hasten to add) is an All Clear signal for a possible lover for my wife ;-))))

  1. 18  Martin Roell http://www.roell.net/weblog | 7/8/2003 9:54:56 AM

    I post my travel information on my blog too. Two thoughts I had about that: 1) If somebody wants to rob a house he is unlikely to check blogs for people that are away and the go for it. So posting the information does not really create a new security risk that makes it more likely for you to get robbed. 2) If somebody wants to do you personal harm (that means if he wants to hurt *you*, Ed Brill, for some reason), he can do so anyway and he won't need your blog for that. It may makes things easier for him, but still: The blog will not be critical then. So, to summarise, I don't think posting travel information on your blog will create a security risk, but this may be difficult for "famous" people or people with (very evil) enemies.

  1. 19  Chris Miller (IdoNotes) http://www.IdoNotes.com | 7/10/2003 11:15:43 AM

    ...they can try and come here (staffed 24x7). Heck, I will even put my stuff out front of the building for them, all the goodies from all the conferences.

  1. 20  Ed Brill http://www.edbrill.com | 7/8/2003 10:05:40 AM

    This topic has been picked up on a couple of German blogs, and I muddled my way through them. One thought there is, many homes are empty during the workday anyway, so this is not uniquely a travel situation. In fact in my situation, my home is never empty during the workday -- my office is here. So I get to keep a watch on my neighborhood while others are away. Not too much going on around here, really.

    Most people seem to be saying that the bad guys are not reading weblogs looking for targets... unless they are, as Martin just said, looking to harm someone personally. And I don't think anyone is after me in that way, though just for good measure, I do stay away from the Seattle area. ;)

    Trackbacks auf Deutsch: Michael Urspringer and H-Blog.