Google and GCA

[Buck Wolter]

This discussion board now shows up in Google searches -- I believe this is a relatively new phenomenon but I can't be sure

Not sure if this link is necessarily the reason for it but I do find it a bit troubling. "Hmmm let me Google this Job Applicant. He hates waterfalls on golf courses -- I love them. No job for him."

http://www.somethingawful.com/articles.php?a=2858

This part of the article is perhaps more ominous for this site as it relates to the private messages.

I'm having to pay a coder just to figure out how to prevent Google from caching all the webpages on our forums. Why is this a problem? Well first of all, it's a giant security hole, as private forums for mods and admins can now be viewed by anybody. Thanks Google, thank you very much for sharing our sensitive information with the entire Internet, without even giving warning or notice to any parties involved! Secondly, our forums offer a private messaging feature, where users can send messages to each other which can only be read by them. It's like AIM or ICQ, but through a webpage. If you're using Google's Web Accelerator - guess what? - now anybody can read your private messages! Cookies, logins, sensitive information, private messages - they're all stored on Google's servers now, and they're all available for anybody on the Internet to read.

[Brent Hutto]

Google doesn't have a magic password-guesser or use any hacks to get around secure web sites. If someone has a forum that's supposed to be private but Google indexes and caches it, then it's because they are putting their forum on a publicly-accessible web server. In other words, if it shows up on Google then it would show up to anyone who cared to look for it without using Google.

The person who wrote the comments that Buck quoted should look up the definition of "private" and also check into the concept of "security through obscurity" before getting his or her panties in a wad about the existence of web-search engines.

I had first noticed our GCA discussions being indexed at least six months ago, don't know if it started earlier than that or not.

[Mike Benham]

GCA pages have shown up on Google and Yahoo search results for years ...

As for the detail of information that you define being available or viewable by the world, that speaks more to the security or lack thereof of your system, company, etc.  

To the best of my knowledge, this is a public message board, and the operators/host of this board operate it as such.  If Ran has contracted with them for a higher level of security and that has been breeched, then it should be taken care of.

Don't blame Google ...

[Michael Moore]

Click here - incredible!

If a web page is secure, the the Google bot/spider cannot search or cache it.

This is a public forum, it is just like standing on your soapbox in Grand Central Station and telling folks what you think about golf course architecture and whatever else you have to say.

[Brent Hutto]

In general, it's a good thing if someone doing a web search for "Fazio", "eye candy" and "bunkers" finds our discussion forum first thing (which as of two minutes ago was true on Google). I can't imagine a better resource than us for enlightenment on that issue. After all, for anyone who thinks to query that issue this is definitely the place to come for like-minded opinions.

[Buck Wolter]

Brent does that mean that the offline messages you can send through this site are 'public', I don't have the technical expertise to know but the comments I posted looked quite a bit like the message area on this site. I'm not sure many here would like to have those 'published'.

[Brent Hutto]

The "Instant Message" feature provided by this forum is only available to you when you're logged in using your forum member's name and password. Google doesn't have any way of knowing those so its crawler can't see them. So no, there shouldn't be any way for them to be published by Google.

As a test, I just typed a couple of phrases from my Instant Messages and they were not found in a Google query. Like you, I would not care to have those messages made public although to be honest I never type anything in an E-mail or electronic forum that I would be mortified to see posted on a billboard in Times Square. Once it's electronic, you never know for sure what the person you send it to might do with it, you know?

[Buck Wolter]

Brent are you related to Robin Hutto who looks to be a Google employee? Just want to make sure your opinion isn't clouded by oodles of option money.

[Bill Gayne]

Buck,

If you want to test it then have someone IM you a very unique set of words and repeatedly google it over time. Brent is correct it will never come up in any google searches.

Bill

[Buck Wolter]

Again -- I am not a techie and I bring this up not as a ludite but for info only. But what I read made it seem like if you used Google's Web Accelerator this info would then be searchable and retrievable.

Perhaps if someone uses that product they can test it out -- I don't.

Buck

From the web accelerator privacy policy:
When you use Google Web Accelerator, Google servers receive and log your page requests. Page requests and data sent in encrypted form using an HTTPS connection will not go through Google. It is possible that some personally identifiable information could be sent to Google, if the information is sent without using an encrypted (HTTPS) connection.

I don't know if the message system here uses HTTPS or not. Caveat Sender

[Mike_Cirba]

I'm truly sort of astounded to do a Google search on my name and find my GCA profile.  

I guess it's a case of be VERY careful what you write.

[Brent Hutto]

I suppose far enough back most Huttos are related but I don't know of any who work for Google. Having some long-held stock options in Google sure would be nice today, unlike most of its cohort who are just answers to trivia questions nowadays.

It sounds like that Accelerator product could have some security holes in it that Google's regular page-indexing crawlers do not. It's not something I would use anyway so I'm not really concerned.

[Ted Kramer]

I'm truly sort of astounded to do a Google search on my name and find my GCA profile.  

I guess it's a case of be VERY careful what you write.

Yeah, now when you try to book your regular weekly 4some at Pine Hill they are going to know that you BASHED the place on GCA.com

-Ted

[MarkT]

The solution is simple to hide this forum from search engines.

http://www.golivecentral.com/pages/txttut/robots.shtml

[Mike_Cirba]

Yeah, now when you try to book your regular weekly 4some at Pine Hill they are going to know that you BASHED the place on GCA.com

-Ted

Just think what's going to happen when I try to renew my annual subscription to the ASGCA fan club!  

[Craig Van Egmond]

You should never post anything on the Internet or say anything in e-mail that you don't want everyone in the world to know about. There are very few secrets on the Internet and more copies of your e-mail than you know.

Not only is Big Brother watching, but so is mom, dad, little sister and that crazy aunt/uncle who lives around the corner.

[Mike Benham]

You should never post anything on the Internet or say anything in e-mail ...

Ditto that for cell phone conversations ...

In the long run, the only way to insure that your conversations whether verbal or written remain secure is by not having them ...

[Buck Wolter]

There is one secure communication technology using the internet -- if you have broadband you should try out skype. www.skype.com  truly is a free lunch.

[Voytek Wilczak]

This is not good when a Google search of your name yields a valid e-mail address from GCA profile (required). Not good at all.

I will ask Ran to change my user name to a pseudonym. I prefer to post under my real name, but this is scary stuff.

[Buck Wolter]

Voytek-
You can hide your email address in your profile -- I just did that.

[Craig Van Egmond]

 

 Hiding your e-mail is an excellent idea. So is having two e-mail accounts, one that you post on boards and use for signing up for things (such as a hotmail or yahoo account) and then your regular e-mail address that you tell your friends and family.

 If you get bored, try setting up a hotmail e-mail account and don't use it anywhere and see how long before you get spammed. My guess is that it won't be long.

[Michael Moore]

The solution is simple to hide this forum from search engines.

Sorry brother, but I am extraordinarily proud of my scribbling here, and I want the searching world to beat a path to our door.

Do you have something to hide?

[MarkT]

Sorry brother, but I am extraordinarily proud of my scribbling here, and I want the searching world to beat a path to our door.

Do you have something to hide?

Absolutely! My wife is not happy finding porno and gambling links on my computer but if she knew I was visiting golf sites she would divorce me