A meme was posted to c/memes@lemmy.world with a partial picture of a driver’s licence. The Lemmy users in the comments proceeded to post all the identifying information they could get from the license, including gender, date of birth, and zip code of the person’s home. The meme is probably reposted and so this isn’t doxxing the Lemmy OP, but that’s what the users in the comments seem to think they’re doing.

Collecting and disseminating someone’s personal information is doxxing even if that information could be found anyway with enough time and knowledge.

  • m-p{3}@lemmy.ca
    451·
    6 days ago

    Moral of the story: when in doubt, pixelize any potential personally identifiable information (aka PII).

      • Hoimo@ani.social
        7·
        5 days ago

        There was also Acropalypse, a bug in a default image editor on Google Pixels which let you undo crops of screenshots. That must be fixed by now, but it’s still something to be aware of. You need to be certain that your edit truly removes the information from the file.

    • starman2112@sh.itjust.works
      13·
      6 days ago

      I get by with simply not posting any PII. I don’t even post pictures from the inside of my apartment, for fear that someone will say “I recognize that floor plan, and that dent in the wall! You live at 2112 North Zimmerly, apartment 626, zip code 67202!” In fact, I obfuscate my identity as much as reasonably possible by only ever telling approximate truths about personal experiences, and outright lies about specifics.

      My name is Pete, I was born May 15th 1995, I’ve lived in Wichita Kansas my entire life, where I’ve worked 3 minimum wage jobs, the latest of which I’ve been at for over 10 years. I have a dog named Charlie and a cat named Scooter. Exactly one statement in this paragraph is true.