I have received several emails requesting my personal IM or email address. I do not do that. And then I never hear from them again. How many have given that out when requested to do so?

Spammers/scammers will do that, esp. on first contact.

ya that's what happened to me too we exchanged emails then he deleted his Mingle like he said.....then when I emailed him he told me to loose his info! we exchanged numbers to text wonder what kinda INFO they can get on a person by doing that?

With a phone number you can find out a heck of a lot about someone. You would be shocked actually. Generally speaking with a phone number youu can find out thier legal name, address, all past addresses where they have had that phone number, frequently the number and ages of people who have lived in each household. If they have vehical or vehicals registerdd at any of those addresses, the drivers licese information,, if they hold any other licenses, and often their credit standing, work history, education, marital status, often their employeers, even their insurers. Since with and address you can actually look at the residence via satellite you can tell what they have for yard furniture and pets. With publiclly available search engines you can see every screenname, photo. forum post, public site they visit, and most that they buy from. Most of this information is free or can ve accessed on virtuaally anyone for a small fee or a flat monthly fee if someone is nosey enough to want it. Thankfully most people are really to noreing or in debt to be much of a taget for national security but it suspected that trillions of dollars are siphoned off for funding things from average people every day becasue most don't bother to notice as long as it is not larger sums or it is not money they are expecting such as that weeks paycheck.

I made that mistake today and the person deactivated account...OOps...

But it's not likely that I would go through the trouble of doing so, unless you were committing crimes on my servers. :) Every website collects that data, but it's used more so for stats.

Anyway, you should be careful of what information you give to people online. Anything may be used to steal your identity, spam you, and scam you. They don't call this the information age for nothing.

To my door step??? Yikes...

I know giving out my personal email could result in the above mentioned, but not finding where I live! Absolutely makes sense though.
Now I am being asked to Skype ..... it never ends does it?

yup - that's why a lot of people use proxy servers - some even use publicly available computers (like the library or work if they can) when on certain sites. I used to that stuff but don't bother any more

I was able, however, with a phone number to essentially sit in someone's front yard via google maps & earth. I don't usually bother with all of that but anything long distance it's nice to know that a physical address is legit

since I'm not considering long distance any longer, I don't bother with all of that any more

so definitely be careful who you call because guys give out their numbers all the time - and if you call them they will then have yours and the possibility to basically know anything that can be learned with a phone #

so even tho u may have nothing to hide - you also want to protect yourself


I think this is why some people change #s frequently