How paranoid should I be?

looksee

I am not usually into conspiracy theories, but...

Yesterday I did a google search for Fenor children's playground as we had been there and I was trying to find a picture to skype to my daughter. In the course of a typed skype discussion I mentioned that we had met some road bowlers outside Fenor - I did not look them up, it was just a single mention.

Today on my facebook page I am invited to join Fenor Road Bowlers fb page. Not any of the sites that I searched (a couple of them were fb pages), just the road bowlers. Where would they get the idea that I might be interested? Even if Road Bowlers is a tag, how would they pick it up from my Skype?

Cee-Jay-Cee

looksee wrote: »

I am not usually into conspiracy theories, but...

Yesterday I did a google search for Fenor children's playground as we had been there and I was trying to find a picture to skype to my daughter. In the course of a typed skype discussion I mentioned that we had met some road bowlers outside Fenor - I did not look them up, it was just a single mention.

Today on my facebook page I am invited to join Fenor Road Bowlers fb page. Not any of the sites that I searched (a couple of them were fb pages), just the road bowlers. Where would they get the idea that I might be interested? Even if Road Bowlers is a tag, how would they pick it up from my Skype?

I think maybe the CIA put their colleagues in the Fenor road bowling club onto you.

looksee

CJC999 wrote: »

I think maybe the CIA put their colleagues in the Fenor road bowling club onto you.

Well right! That's what I am worried about :-)

mad muffin

Every site you visit. Every word you type. I'll be watching you.



<shifty eyes>

Mr. Incognito

Imagine how sophisticated spy networks are.

You are wrong. Triple it.

The technology military firms have with unlimited budgets is phenomenal

Mr_Red

So did you join Fenor Road Bowlers

MRnotlob606

I got ed snowden on speed
dial he reckons its the NSA

kylith

I'd say you should be fairly paranoid.

Also, the Fenor playground is brilliant.

BabysCoffee

I blame Google

DeanAustin

mad muffin wrote: »

Every site you visit. Every word you type. I'll be watching you.



<shifty eyes>

Anyone else read this to the tune of The Police song?

ryan101

Mr_Red wrote: »

So did you join Fenor Road Bowlers

It's a cover name for a CIA Op in Ireland
He could tell you, but there on you'd have to wear a tinfoil hat to protect your brain waves

Mena

DeanAustin wrote: »

Anyone else read this to the tune of The Police song?

Pretty sure that was the intent.

renegademaster

if you had been bothered enough to follow Edward snodens exposing of the us led spy network you'd know that not only are you private typed Skype and the rest are recorded, filtered and exploited, the private video chats you thought you were having well they're not so private, even when you type something but decide to edit or not send anything well what you were considering sending has been logged. Google guardian editor answers questions nsa spying

Duggy747

The satanic illumaniti government lizards are watching you and trying to keep you down.......................man.

EDIT: Ah, just saw you did a Google search, that's where the ads are coming from based on recent / popular search history of yours.

Caliden

The ads on facebook are based off searches you've made.

Type Fenor in facebook and the bowlers group is one of the top groups.

Did you search for Fenor playground in google or facebook?

mad muffin

OP. I don't want to make you anymore paranoid but

looksee

I did not google search the bowlers, but I did search the playground, for which there are numerous sites and some fb pages. The road bowlers did not come up in any of those searches. I only mentioned the road bowlers in a typed skype conversation.

Yes, I know you get ads based on google searches, I did one search about 6 months ago for a particular UK shop and I am still getting ads about what they have on offer!

Tiddlypeeps

I would be suprised if Microsoft were selling info to advertisers directly from you chat conversations. It's a huge breech of privacy that is very blatant. I know they hand everything over to the NSA but (until snowden) that was something users weren't likely to find out about and it's something they were compelled to do.

Web advertising is fairly sophisticated. They don't just use your searches, they use your profile information too. So the road bowlers probably put an ad out to all people who tick certain boxes, they live near or recently searched the location, they are of a certain age, gender, have expressed interest in other spots etc. etc. They could have even added the Fenor playground itself as a key search term. It's still a pretty big coincidence, but it's not at all outside the realms of possibility.

If you want to test skype for that type of thing, just arrange to have a conversation with someone about a range of products that you have no interest in and would never have googled anything related to it.

c_man

Considering some of the *ahem* stuff I do search for on Google, I'm very disappointed that I haven't been invited to any orgies in my locale.

problemchimp

renegademaster wrote: »

if you had been bothered enough to follow Edward snodens exposing of the us led spy network you'd know that not only are you private typed Skype and the rest are recorded, filtered and exploited, the private video chats you thought you were having well they're not so private, even when you type something but decide to edit or not send anything well what you were considering sending has been logged. Google guardian editor answers questions nsa spying

No need to have a go at the op about being "bothered to follow Ed Snowden".

gramar

I'm amazed that advertising is so big online and how much is paid for information about users. Personally I don't take a whole lot of notice if any at all.