---
title: "\"There is no privacy!\" On the confidentiality of personal information"
author: "Stan Voo"
url: https://www.99rabbits.com/blog/there-is-no-privacy
published: 2010-08-20
summary: "I was mulling a post on privacy when a scam letter arrived, addressed to my surname, at a work inbox that never carried my name anywhere. So how did they know?"
---

# "There is no privacy!" On the confidentiality of personal information

I was just mulling over a post on privacy when, out of nowhere, a rather interesting piece of spam landed in one of my work mailboxes. (How about that!)

> Dear Parshin,
>
> I Barrister Edwin Roland (esquire), lawyer in law\.personal lawyer Mr.Robert Parshin, who was contractor of European development after company.Herein shall be transferred with my client, on September 11, 2001 my client was involved in world trade center bombing.unfortunately died three months after the incident, due to injuries he substained as result of explosion, since then I have made several inquiries to your embassy to find any of my client's extended relatives, but it was unsuccessful.
>
> After these several unsuccessful attempts, I decided to track your surname to find any of his relatives, consequently I contacted of you to provide assistance in repatriation of fund in amount of 10.5 million US dollars, left by my client, until it is confiscated or declared unserviceable by financial security firm in Lome / Togo, where this huge sum was deposited for keeping in trunk box under the sphere of family valuables. Said security company issued me notice to provide next of kin or this square confiscated within next 21 official working days, as they do not know contents of the box.
>
> Since I unsuccessfully in search of relatives more than 9years now, I ask your consent to present you as next of kin of the deceased, so that proceedings of this window may be transferred to you.Therefore on receipt of your positive answer, we shall then discuss using coefficient and conditions of transfer, as I have all necessary information and legal documents required for You by for claim.
>
> All that I demand from you your honest cooperations to allow us to see this deal to end. I guarantee that this will be carried out under lawful arrangement which will protect you from any breach of law.
>
> Thank you for your quick answer.
>
> Barr. Edwin Roland
>
> Principal prosecutors

**A typical Nigerian scam letter**... It would all be fine if the letter had come to my personal Gmail inbox, which actually does contain my surname.

But the thing is, my work mail runs on [Google Apps](http://www.google.com/apps/intl/ru/business/index.html), its address is made of the domain name and the word "biz", and it doesn't contain my surname. What's more, I've never used my surname together with that mailbox anywhere in publications (or ads). The only time, naturally, was **registering the mailbox** with Google. There's a form there where they ask for your surname. The form is sent over an unsecured connection (http), and I have three explanations:

1. The spammers somehow read this data when the mailbox was registered (by installing something on my side, for example);
2. The spammers tracked down my surname in some intelligent way (by hand, for example) and linked it to this mailbox;
3. Google sold my account data to spammers (it's free, by the way).

The question remains open. The subject of privacy (or rather its absence) remains undisclosed.

I recommend watching a video on the subject: [Steven Rambam. Privacy is Dead - Get Over It](http://vimeo.com/13644580) (in English, on Vimeo), or [the translated text on Habr](http://habrahabr.ru/blogs/infosecurity/100043/), the Russian-language tech community.

A Habr user called [noonesshadow](http://noonesshadow.habrahabr.ru/) was apparently so impressed that he did an incredible job of turning the video into Russian text :) Great honor to him for that. Give him an upvote, those of you who are on Habr :)