The Internet Site Spokeo: I Know What You Did Last Summer (and Last Night)

I found out about Spokeo in a Newsweek article. It is an interesting idea for a website, but privacy concerns are the one issue that might hinder the website's success.

What is Spokeo?

It is a site that culls information about your friends and contacts from social networking sites like Myspace, Friendster, and Facebook. You can click on your friend's name in your spokeo profile to see what photos, blogs, etc. are available on the internet. You can only view information that is open to the public. For example, if a Myspace user's settings are set to private you have to have access on myspace to see that profile or you can't see it on spokeo.

How does Spokeo get my contacts and friends?

This is another privacy concern for some: you enter your email login and password into spokeo, and the site then combs through your account to get your contact and friend info. Then it searches the web for public information linked to those email addresses.

Wow, won't that aid cyber-stalkers?

Perhaps, perhaps not. If someone is cyber-stalking you, they will find a way to find out what they want. All of the information available on Spokeo is available readily on the web anyway. You would have to do manual searches on individual networking sites and/or search engine searches for the person's name and email address to find the info. on your own, but it is available. Spokeo does make it more convenient to check up on the newest entries and updates that all of your friends make though. It really cuts down on the time it would take to check out each contact's pages on all the different sites they are members at.

I don't like this. Shouldn't it be illegal?

Not really. Public documents are just that: public. I could go down to the county courthouse and read about anyone's run-ins with the law, whether it's a traffic violation or a robbery. Better yet, I can just search my local sheriff or clerk of courts website and find out your record.
Spokeo doesn't offer this kind of dirt on you and your friends (unless you blog about it somewhere online); it just offers online photos, blogs, etc. that are linked to the particular email address that your friends have.

If you don't want your family to see that hilarious photo of you drunk dancing on the table tops you could do a couple of things: don't let them have the email that you use to sign up for sites like Myspace or Facebook; or just don't post that kind of photo online.

Overall Spokeo seems like a fun and interesting website that makes it easy for us to keep up to date on what are friends and family are up to. Of course its powers can be used for good or evil. That's just how life, and technology, are sometimes.