Slashdot Mirror
Gmail Reveals the Names of All Users
ihatespam writes "Have you ever wanted to know the name of admin@gmail.com? Now you can. Through a bug in Google calendars the names of all registered Gmail accounts are now readily available. All you need to find out the names of any gmail address is a Google calendar account yourself. Depending on your view this ranges from a harmless "feature" to a rather serious privacy violation. According to some reports, spammers are already exploiting this "feature"/bug to send personalized spam messages."
The person(s) responsible for this bug is going to have a nice and very uncomfy meeting with their supervisor very soon...
If I was worried about privacy with my gmail account, google wouldn't have my actual name to have the ability to give it out.
This bug really doesn't affect me as my email address is my real name.
How we know is more important than what we know.
oh noes! they can figure out my real name just by using google calendar and my email address (first.last@gmail.com)!?
Didn't your mother teach you not to do things you would be ashamed to see on the evening news?
In short, yes. Ever since GMail was launched and people discovered that its way more convenient that Outlook/Yahoo/etc., there's been a steady conversion of addresses in my contact list to "@gmail.com". People are moving to GMail as their primary mail accounts -- I don't know if you've been listening since 1998, but "free web-based email" is now often much, much better than whatever your university/company offers.
So yeah, this is a pretty big deal -- not so much for spammers, but as a privacy violation. You can't do a name lookup for an arbitrary e-mail address, and you shouldn't be able to do it for a GMail address. Someone should get an ass-kicking for this.
An old-timer with old-timey ideas.
chunkylover53 is going to be most displeased.
IBM doesn't play chess with the Universe.
I always wondered who registered my email address. No wonder it seemed like so many people shared my name. - I.P. Freely
ahah! But now the spammers KNOW FOR SURE that there isn't an underscore/dash/whatever between your first and last name! You're so screwed!
Really, now everyone will know my name is John Smith? I am outraged and will see my lawyer immediately!
-- john.smith@gmail.com
With their track record of leaking information and giving it to whatever business asks them for it; why would anyone trust them with actual true information anymore?
But, does this constitute evil? So far so good. My gmail account is my real name anyway. I'll be looking out for the evil...
Everything I've ever learned the hard way was based on a statistically invalid sample.
Someone should get an ass-kicking for this.
Agreed. I'll certainly be asking for my money back...
This is exactly why I remain leery of applications in the cloud. I've got a google account for work, and that's the only use it ever sees. And it's under real.name.company anyway, and has no other useful information associated with it.
I try really, really hard not to leave to broad a trail online. Those databases just never die (except when they do, of course - but the timing is subject to Murphy's Law, so it's never in my favor).
I'm gonna go hide in my cave now.
cogito ergo dubito
Gmail strips out punctuation. So email to First.Last@gmail.com goes to the same inbox as FirstLast@gmail.com
I know individuals with a hell of a lot of sense who would give their real names in such a situation.
So? Part of the reason for that is that full names in and of themselves are not really a security risk. I walk around all day in public with an ID badge that gives my first and last name. Big deal. Our names are our public identifiers.
If a job's not worth doing, it's not worth doing right.
I have that same combination on my luggage!!
Does this mean they're only sending spam to people who really need Cialis?
Why not? I know 3 people with my same first and last name (and my name isn't very common) so I'm pretty sure that by giving my real name I'm not actually giving anything.
The email address is actually more of an identifier than your real name as 2 people cannot have the same email address.
Now, if together with the real name, one can obtain your home address, then I'd be really concerned.
Why would they have such an unnecessary expense?
I have no problem giving people my gmail account address for business-type-transactions because it is a hell of a lot easier to keep track of my conversations and actually get business done using gmail. When I do need a "professional" email address I usually just have it forwarded to my gmail account, again, because it is easier to keep my life organized that way.
Not to mention how great gmail and Google Calendar Sync work on my BlackBerry.
It has really become a first-rate application suite for just about every use.
-nick
Then they'll know what part is your first and last name regardless of capitalization! THIS IS HUGE!
for a small business owner, why not. I manage a few websites. Very, very small. Less than 20 people have write access. They wanted email. some users would use outlook or outlook express, others wanted a web mail front end. The email client the hosting service had was horrible so I hooked them up with a gmail hosted services. It works very, very nicely for them.
there are some cases where Google is a good alternative to other options.
This is horrible. This is an outrage! I'm writing Google a letter telling them how awful this is an how they need to work on the Q/A. I mean my GMail address *IS* my full name, but I'm not going to let that fact stop me from acting like an emotionally charged idiot!
No sig for you!!
I mean really... Does anyone with a lick of sense actually give their real name to a free web-based service?
I have difficulty believing the title of my reply will become true. I'd like to believe no one will ever let this happen, but here's a recent Slashdot post that raises some alarm:
"The access to MySpace was unauthorized because using a fake name violated the terms of service. The information from a "protected computer" was the profiles of other MySpace users. If this is found to be a valid interpretation of the law, it's really quite frightening. If you violate the Terms of Service of a website, you can be charged with hacking. That's an astounding concept. Does this mean that everyone who uses Bugmenot could be prosecuted? Also, this isn't a minor crime, it's a felony punishable by up to 5 years imprisonment per count. In Drew's case she was charged with three counts for accessing MySpace on three different occasions."
Fact: Everything I say is fiction.
Ditto.
Since all names are really all about pretense, I set up mine on Gmail as "firstnamelastname@gmail.com" (Where 'firstname' and 'lastname' are my actual names.
I think there are only eight or ten other people in the US with my same spelled the same anyway. Regardless, I think Gmail's spam filters have only let a couple of false negatives into my Inbox.
*THIS* is why I use very different passwords for web mail as say, my banking or credit report service passwords, etc... If the password file were to be breached, I would only have one to change.
I suggest a good password management app such as this one: http://passwordsafe.sourceforge.net/
What, your parents named you Quantum G?
Now everyone knows that my first name is Anonymous and my last name is Coward. I'm screwed. The Church of Scientology will finally find me.
I was called a heretic for suggesting that "Google does not know all..."
Guess I owe some folks an apology...
Really, did anyone not see this coming? The company advertised that they read your email.
The society for a thought-free internet welcomes you.
This seems to be rather a moron bug than anything else. They can have my fake alias name. What I worry about is rather how they treat the content of what's being sent and received.
Postglobalism: Reclaiming civilization
It's a good thing they caught this in beta, before it affects a large number of people!
http://www.theonion.com/content/node/44460
http://notanumber.net/
So yeah, this is a pretty big deal -- not so much for spammers, but as a privacy violation. You can't do a name lookup for an arbitrary e-mail address, and you shouldn't be able to do it for a GMail address. Someone should get an ass-kicking for this.
You know what else... Someone left a thick softcover book on my doorstep the other day that listed the names, addresses, and phone numbers of everyone in my region. Hundreds of thousands of people, maybe millions. I called the police about this, but they seemed unconcerned.
...is that this will allow Phishing scams aimed at GMail users to *seem* so much more plausible.
What? You expected humour?
Given that my Gmail email address is my real first and last name, separated by a period, I don't think it's a big deal that my real name will be revealed through the calendar. I don't care. There are a million of me out there anyway. I've Googled my own name before and found that I'm several professors, an artist, a few musicians, a business owner or two, and a bunch of other things. I didn't find myself in there even after wading through about 300 results. So this ain't an issue. But if your name is Rumpelstiltskin DiScrewdio, then you're screwed because there's only one of you out there.
McCain/Palin '08. Now THAT's hope and change!
The Families Educational Rights and Privacy Act of 1974 allows a student at a university to require the university to not release their name to anyone. For example, if you check for my name at my school's phonebook, you'll find I'm not listed. If you call my registrar's office and ask for information on me, they'll tell you that they don't have a student by my name. You see, it's against the law for them to even confirm that I'm a student.
Since many schools have outsourced their email systems to Gmail, anyone can generate a full roster of student names through this trick. This could obviously result in many violations of FERPA.
So how do I go about testing this on myself? (as 100 posts reply with my real name.... Scrooge McDuck)
Ok...so I only see this as an issue for people trying to hide their identity for something nefarious. I mean christ, I give out my full name a dozen times a day to people I don't know. "Hello, we have a circuit down and need to open a ticket." "Hello, I have a few questions about your product." and damned near every other statement you might make when calling another company is almost IMMEDIATELY followed by "Can I have your name please?" Of course this is after they answer the phone "Hello, my name is..."? Now granted they don't always use their last name if they are just phone jockeys, but almost anyone worth anything in terms of sales/technical/etc reps will give you their full name, email address, phone number, etc.
In other news, purchasing cigarettes and alcohol require you to disclose your first and last name when you show your ID! Even worse, there are rumors that every time you make a purchase using anything other than cash you have to disclose your first and last name. This isn't a privacy issue, maybe a privacy irritation, but certainly not anything to get in a ruffle about. It isn't like names are even really unique identifiers. Now if it revealed birthdays or SSNs or credit card numbers or something then I would understand.
Course, maybe there is something here I am ignoring. Do the people getting in a ruffle about this freak out when someone of the opposite sex asks their name? "Oh my god they are trying to invade my privacy!" Generally it is considered "normal" to give them your name so they have something to call you other than "freak" or "uberhax4234".
The only change I can believe in is what I find in my couch cushions.
Because it looks unprofessional (may be a pro or con depending on the business)
ie mike@mikesauto.com versus mike34534@hotmail.com
There is also the superficial sense of security. When I send email to Mike at his domain I'm pretty sure he is the only one reading it (although it very well could also be the isp, hosting domain, his sysadmin, and NSA). When I send email to hotmail or gmail, perhaps unfounded, I have the feeling that if they felt like it MS or google could be reading the emails and no-one would know it and/or a security breach could leak access to everyone's email.
Honestly - your name isn't a secret...
and if you're trying to hide your identity and you put your real first / last name into a free service, you're a moron.
You mean Bob Marley, Elvis Presley, Jimi Hendrix, and Al Gore HAVEN'T come back from the dead and signed up for emails with Gmail thousands of times from thousands of different locations? -Registered Spammer
I am the richest astronaut ever to win the superbowl.
citation needed. seriously, what you describe would be a huge security/privacy hole, and I don't believe you.
This goes well beyond the scope of SPAM. Once they match your real name with your e-mail, they can start finding out what you do online, what sites/forums you visit, etc (Google knows everything).
I'm much more worried about ID thieves finding out about my life than about getting personalized spam.
Don't tell me that I'm the first person on ./ to know that the REAL NAME of admin@gmail.com is "smart ass"!
And to think I'm only posting as A.C.! Oh the shame!
there's been a steady conversion of addresses in my contact list to "@gmail.com". People are moving to GMail as their primary mail accounts
/dev/null.
As have I - But that has no bearing on whether or not people give GMail their real names. I know I sure as hell didn't, despite using that account for a number of legitimate purposes, including professional contacts.
And as a bonus, anyone foolish enough to spam me under a name I give to a random website actually helps my spam filtering, because I never give my real name. If someone sends "Petrov L. Aster" (as just one example I might use for my Slashdot handle) a notice that he has an inheritance from a Nigerian uncle, that message doesn't even make it to my "once a month quick look through non-whitelisted garbage" folder - it meets a hard blacklist and goes straight to
Actually, that's inaccurate, this was debunked a while ago. I can't remember the link off the top of my head but it's not true.
All your base are belong to Wii.
Posting to clear moderation because I was brainless and didn't get the joke.
The role of the writer is not to say what we can all say, but what we are unable to say. -Anais Nin
You do realise you give LOTS of mail servers WAY more private information every time you send or RECIEVE a non-encrypted e-mail, right? Mommy wrote you saying happy birthday and signed her message with her full name? Your employer, coworker or friends ever wrote you an e-mail ? Seriously, if you worry about google knowing your full name I think you should probably panic right about now given that everybody who has ever sent you an e-mail FROM gmail has given google a hell of a lot more info about you. Heck chances are that using just data stored by google it is possible to deduce the names of the majority of your coworkers, a good portion of your friends, where you live, a good number of your interests, as well as the birthday of your uncle.
That people get worked up about things like google knowing their name tells you a whole lot about just how little they realise about what google knows.
False. For GMail, dots are invisible in regards to who receives the email. Emails sent to foobar@gmail.com and foo.bar@gmail.com and f.o.o.b.a.r@gmail.com all go to the same address. Messages sent to foo.bar@gmail.com don't go to bar@gmail.com.
Really, I wonder how many times people have used bugs like this to steal an identity, only to find that it's all fake info anyhow.
Personally, every few years, I Re-invent someone... Use a fake(completely fake, not false) identity for everything from Cellphones to gmail.
I google my real name, nothing, google my 'fake' like 20 pages. My 'fake' identity is WAY more famous than I am... I'm kinda jealous.
THE WORLD IS GOING TO END!!!! eventually.
Man, the word 'Beta' is becoming like patents in terms of length.
If only Microsoft had released Vista Beta instead we'd have no reason to complain!
"I only speak the truth"
Karma: null(Mostly affected by an unassigned variable)
you are incorrect. john.richards@gmail.com send mail to johnrichards@gmail.com not to richards@gmail.com. Stripping the punctuation means gmail ignores it, not kills off the first part.
what you are talking about is using + in your email address: see here Google Blog
-- All this knowledge is giving me a raging brainer.
No, her parents named her Moon Unit. What kind of fucking name would "Quantum G" be?!?!
Frankly, Google seems to be gathering excessive power and not doing so well on the responsibility part. In general, they have become far too helpful to spammers, so I suggested a way that Google could be much less helpful to the spammers--but there is no evidence they are interested in it. Does their understanding of evil somehow exempt the spammers?
On the general privacy thing, Too many companies are collecting too much of our personal data--and then treating it like their corporate property. I deeply resent it, but at least it isn't anything special about Google. Or maybe it is, insofar as Google is especially skilled at using information, and therefore poses the greater threat for potential abuse... What I want it a privacy option to store my personal information on *MY* computer, and they can ask when they want to look at it--and they had better ask nicely, too. (Actually, I want an automated system of user-controlled privacy preferences to handle most of this...)
Freedom = (Meaningful - Coerced) Choice != (Speech | Beer^2), and sad sock puppets' bad mods avail them naught.
That's just paranoia. Everyone with administrative/root access to the mail server could read them, not that they care what's in there usually. The fact that someone is paying for their mailbox or not has nothing to do with that. You are probably safer with the big names, at least they have established protocols and guidelines for privacy...
Besides you can have your @yourdomain.com email with google too, for free. Ever heard of google apps? http://www.google.com/a/help/intl/en/index.html
Wait, the Rolexes are fake?!?!
eBay sent this message to FULL NAME (account)
Your registered name is included to show this message originated from eBay. Learn more.
The "Learn more" link takes you to http://pages.ebay.com/help/confidence/name-userid-emails.html which explains
Since people who send out spoof emails often don't have your first and last name as well as eBay User ID, receiving an email that contains this information should increase your confidence that the email was sent by eBay.
Whooosh.
I am aware of the period-ignoring feature, by which gmail treats Bob.Smith@ and Bo.bS.mith@ and BobSmith@ as the same person. That is not at issue. The parent claims that email sent to Bob.Smith@ is also delivered to [just] Smith@, which I believe to be false.
There are two X's in Rolexx.
Posting to say that I moderated you Funny, then realized that "[I've] already posted something in this discussion."
Where 'firstname' and 'lastname' are my actual names.
Damn! Some nasty name you got there! Perhaps I'll name my son 'firstname' too!
Oh man! So email can be sent to me at the.rapist@gmail.com or therapist@gmail.com?
The summary states, "Depending on your view this ranges from a harmless 'feature' to a rather serious privacy violation."
There is no view, this is absolutely an outright product of incompetence, oversight, and cluelessness. This is definitely a bug, even if Google touts it as a feature. We've seen this before, with Google calendar appointments/conference call numbers made publicy accessible via incompetence.
Inexcusable.
I was like, really concerned for a minute. I thought spammers had managed to access something *important* or something.
So, this is about someone that already knows my email address accessing the "name" that I show on every email I send out?
To quote "The Whole Nine Yards" -
*Oh* *My* *Gawd*!
Pug
An Invisible Entity of Vast Power whose existence must be taken on faith alone: Liberal Media
is just my Social Security number.
Dweezil?
What?
Yes, and using the exploit referred to in the article, your real names will be revealed as Jekyll and Hyde, respectively.
A World in a Grain of Sand / Heaven in a Wild Flower,
Infinity in the Palm of your Hand / And Eternity in an Hour.
A World in a Grain of Sand / Heaven in a Wild Flower,
Infinity in the Palm of your Hand / And Eternity in an Hour.
A better method for customizing your registered email address is to use "+" on the left side. "me+example.com@gmail.com" should be directed to "me@gmail.com" by their system. I say "should" simply because I've never tested the "+" feature with "."s in "it."
"
I"m sorry, I seem to have a quotation infesta""tion. The information"s correct, though.
Your brain is not a computer.
However, there exists one and only one of me.
I wouldn't be so sure of that. I've run into many people in my time who were "Motherfucking Shit"s.
I'll stick with my tiny, anonymized 3rd party free web based (and solar hosted) email provider, thanks.
I'll stick to earth-based email providers, thank you very much. Though off-planet backups are helpful in case of catastrophe.
.sig withheld by request
I've used about every service that they have had, and this is pretty much how everything they do works. You don't opt in for anything, you have to figure out how to eventually opt out.
You fumble through the options screen and finally find the right combination of checkboxes that doesn't throw your name out there, and let everyone see everything by default.
"Hey guess what users, we added this nice option that lets everyone see your real name, address, and link to a picture of your house on google maps. Don't worry, it's been already enabled for your convenience!"
Al Gore isn't dead, he's just resting!
"I only speak the truth"
Karma: null(Mostly affected by an unassigned variable)
here
And it will go to the owner of last@gmail.com too. There's a lot of accounts with simple names like richards@gmail.com or gonzales@gmail.com which get ALL e-mail sent to owners of a dotted mail, for example: juan.gonzales@gmail.com, john.richards@gmail.com.
Is this unclear in some way? He is claiming that mail to first.last@gmail.com is delivered to last@gmail.com, which is hopefully and almost certainly false.
Not only the period, the "+" sign also gives you the variation:
abcdef@gmail.com
abcdef+1@gmail.com
abcdef+2@gmail.com
and so on.
Note: This does NOT work in Facebook.
"The New Age. The New Beginning."
They also ignore anything after a + sign, so I use username+site@gmail.com to sign up for legit stuff where I think there's a chance of getting spammed in the future, if I do get spammed on that alias I write a rule to drop it to the floor and contact the company letting them know they now have zero chance of getting future business with me. The only problem is when a stupid validation script writer doesn't know how to read an RFC and claims the address is invalid. In that case they get my old excite address which is nothing but a spamhole. I guess I could use my google apps address, but it's too much of a pain to create a new user just for one site and I never read the catchall mailbox unless I know I'm missing an important email.
There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.
And two O's in Roloxx. You know it's the real thing because the dial on the watch face goes up to eleven.
Citation is myself witnessing it, last time about 6 months ago. Google must have probably fixed it.
I've received e-mails sent to vincenzo.myaccount@gmail.com, ornella.myaccount@gmail.com and many others. I DONT own those accounts, how could you explain that?
I've got them right there on my inbox. And I personally know four people that saw the same thing. I've reported it to google two times in its time and so far I've received no reply.
mine goes to thirteen...
MP3 Search Engine
just create any calender entry (single click on an empty field) with just the gmail address in the main 'What:' field, select 'don't send' and open it up (double click)... there you see the full user name of the gmail account.
;)
Not sure why the article makes it so complicated...
So the admin@gmail.com guy is named 'smart ass'... poor fellow
You may have been given a book that does name->phone-number lookups for those who have not chosen to opt out but I believe that it is very much harder to get access to the inverse function that does phone-number->name lookups. I suspect that it varies by jurisdiction but I believe that in some places at least, people can be in serious trouble for giving access to the database that performs that function to those who do not have the proper authorization.
Those who are familiar with security will know the concept of work-factor. You can reverse lookup with a phone book but if all you have is a printed copy it is a lot of work. The cost of doing that work is the deterrent. Modern technology has made it easier, but it is still costly. The idea is to adjust the cost/benefit ratio so that an attack is not worthwhile.
The concern for the revealing of names from addresses is that it makes it cheaper for confidence tricksters to deliver some plausible message that will trick people into giving them some of their money. If the average cost of creating the plausible message becomes less than the expected return then the level of scamming will increase. Those of us not taken in by the tricksters will still suffer from increased level of junk so it is in all our interests to take this kind of thing seriously.
[citation needed]
Check the message headers. Probably, the envelope recipient (SMTP RCPT To) was your account and the header "To:" was the address you don't own.
There are no karma whores, only moderation johns
Have you considered a career with NASA?
Well, grow up. Even if this particular one doesn't affect you, it does show the kind of privacy problems that google has _again_. And it seems to be perfect illustration of what a few Google deffecters were ranting about recently.
Depending on what of their services you use, Google usually has a lot more data about you than your name. E.g., your searches, the news/mailing-lists you're subscribed to, your credit card number if you use their payment processor, possibly your medical history, etc. Heck, it even has the contents of your emails. Now that's something to worry about.
Now also bear in mind that a lot of that information has the potential to be worse than it really is, if taken out of context. E.g., if you're a Muslim and searched for "AK-47 tactics", I can assure you that the nice guys from the government won't think of Counter-Strike first. And I hope you don't mind waterboarding if you search for a map that involves placing a bomb at a refinery, and used the wrong wording. It's the same guys who tried to data-mine grocery purchases to find terrorists, i.e., anyone who orders arab kinda food.
So, yes, stop acting like an emotionally charged idiot. I know that some people get a boner out of defending Google, but grow up. They do have a recurring QA problem, and they do store all data about everyone they can get their hands on. (See their fighting the EU to keep everyone's search data for ever.) Yes, maybe this time it doesn't affect you, but it illustrates a broader problem they have. Unless they start taking QA and privacy seriously, it's only a matter of time before they leak something a lot more sensitive.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
Actually there is another feature of Gmail that was advertised through their blog. And it states that me+nospam@gmail.com is directed to me@gmail.com
So basically all the characters after the + sign (including it) in the email address is stripped to determine to receiver. You will see that the email has been sent to me+nospam@gmail.com and then can filter on it. If used intelligently, it can tell you which site is selling your email address to other 3rd party companies.
Drifting OT but I've found that MD5 passwords are a great way to have unique passwords for a site, eg.
md5("MySecretPassword-www.somesite.com")
Means you can use 1 password for everything without revealing it to any sites
I'm going to name my kid 'lastname' instead.
I wondered why all the spam was suddenly titled, "Hey Satanic!" and "Dear Mr. Puppy"
ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
....
The category is Therapists. Not The Rapists, Mr. Connery.
Well then I'll take The Penis Mightier for 500!
Posting because I like waffles.
Forget the catchall mailbox. http://mailinator.com/ has a great system for disposable email addresses, with the caveat that you shouldn't use it if your personal information is on the line. But if you just need to give an email address to a site and get something in return that's not sensitive, it's fantastic.
Both of these features are compliant with the RFC and are not uncommon, there is a reason the RFCs for email refer to the left hand side of the "@" as the "local part" since it is mostly up to the local mx to determine how to treat this portion.
-*The above statement is printed entirely on recycled electrons*-