I received this from another Roots-L list. I thought this list might like a
heads-up
warning also.
Jo
Website sells your personal info...
This came from Dick Eastman's Online Genealogy Newsletter. I thought it has
some interesting complications for those of us who are used to helping each
other and are sometimes a little gullible about commercial sites.
Jean
Genealogy Web Site Sells Your Name and E-mail Address
It's a tough world. Lots of businesses sell their customer lists
these days. The result is that you get junk mail and marketing
phone calls from all sorts of companies trying to sell you
something you probably don't want. The newest twist is "spam
mail", unwanted e-mails that advertise all sorts of junk. Now a
well-known genealogy Web site is contributing to the spam mail
that you receive and apparently is profiting from personal
information that they obtain from you under the guise of helping
you do genealogy research. In fact, the Web site apparently is a
"front", as the main purpose seems to be gathering personal
information about you and then selling that information.
The Family Tree House Web site at
http://www.usaafter.com claims
that it is "the Association for FamilyTree Enrollment and
Registry." The home page says, "This site offers free family tree
software and links to key genealogy sites. The software is
available on-line. You can build your FamilyTree House in real
time, no downloading is required."
They also say, "...you can create and register your own on-line
FamilyTree. And because it is on-line, you can enlist the help of
other family members by giving them your personal access code to
allow them to fill in the missing branches--it's a project the
whole family can participate in no matter where they live." On
another page the site advises, "When requesting information,
please make sure you include your name, mailing address and the
information you would like."
After they collect all the personal information from you and your
other family members, the owners of Family Tree House apparently
package the information and sell it to other companies that send
junk mail or spam e-mails. On a different Web site, the owners of
Family Tree House offer "a file of 33,600 last-12-month
registrants of the Family Tree House, an association that offers
Web site members free software and links to genealogy sites." The
file they sell reportedly contains information about each person's
date of birth, gender, e-mail address, state and ZIP code. The Web
advertisement says that the file contains listings for 33,600
people who have left personal information on the Family Tree House
site.
To check for yourself, first look at
http://www.usaafter.com and
then look at:
http://www.mediacentral.com/Magazines/DirectNewsline/Archive/1998100910.htm
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