Genealogy Chat

I havent been a member very long, but i have been a little worried about some of the comments your experienced GR users ,have made recently about the security and privacy of using GR, Since being a member i have had no problems but lots of help from other members,but i am now worried about using GR. What should i be doing to make sure my information is secure on here. I love doing my research on here, as other members have been so helpful, and my tree as got so much further in no time at all. oh and what is a name taker. Advice please. Thankyou Pauline/

Hi Pauline I read about the bit that someone put on here saying dont use your real name cos people can use it , i have never had any probs yet i would think a site like GR is quite safe , well i hope so , maybe someone else can enlighten us both if i am wrong then i am off to change my name LOL Carol

Thanks ladies , im just a worrier i suppose, but what with all this identity theft, it just gets you thinking. Regards Pauline

Correct me if I'm wrong as I hope someone will..... ...but....I THINK people can join GR but not pay and that allows them to read our message boards but they can only add a message to the 'trying to find' one. None of the others. Gerri

Gerri - and the success board (remember last year's fiascos?).

It's wrong isnt it Marion? If I pay to be a member of a social club......I dont expect to see non members at the bar! Gerri Yes I do remember last year....youngsters trying to find lost parents and the like...very VERY young!

Absolutely, Gerri, and many of us have said so to GR again and again ... Got to go. Night night.

I have to be careful what I say here....I believe, from advice I have had from IT experts, that GR is a hackproof site. So...any little strange happenings must be insider jobs, and I don't mean members. The best way to protect your sensitive information is not to put it on any public tree. Disguise your living relatives by calling them Living Male and Living Female. Do not put your children under 18 on a public tree - that includes GR tree. You are never going to pick up a connection via your children under 18, other than one you might not want. Don't open your tree to the world and his dog - you wouldnt let a stranger go through your desk, would you! Establish by pm that there is a definite connection and then send a report by pm of the branch of your tree which concerns them. Apart from these sensible precautions there is really very little you can do to completely protect yourself, but life is full of risks - just make sure you take calculated risks. OC

And whatever you do, don't rely on the GR ''hide living relatives'' button - it just doesn't work: The full date of birth of the hidden name shows up on the shared tree, even though the actual name is replaced by ''living relative''. The colour of the box tells you the sex of the person. It is very simple to determine the surname by moving back up the tree along the male line until you find a non-living ancestor. Then, armed with the surname, sex and year of birth, go to the name search on this site. This will reveal the first name and birthplace of the so-called ''hidden'' name, along with a helpful ''yes'' in the prior contact column so that you know you have the right one. And if you want to double-check, go back to the shared tree and search for the name/year that you've found - it will come up with one hit, for ''living relative''!!! Click on that hit and you'll be taken to the right box on the tree. In other words, the living relatives are about as well hidden as a five-year-old's Easter eggs are by the Easter bunny. Therefore, I reiterate what was said above - just don't enter the details of any living relatives in the first place - you can't trust GR with your confidential data, I'm afraid. Richard