managing and protecting nyms...

[John Case]

I should have asked this years ago when there was more traffic/users on 
this list (and I was using a different nym[1]) ... but years ago there was 
not such established proof of data correlation in "anonymized" data sets 
(netflix, "anonymized" medical data, etc.)

So, in the post-netflix, post-aol-user-data[2] world, I am doing the 
following to sanitize my online nyms:

- establishing a distinct user account, on a different provider, for each 
topic I discuss.  For instance, this nym only discusses 
encryption/"yro"/tor subjects.

- Scrubbing my language of certain idiosyncratic phraseology or blatant 
aspects of "style" ... favored slang, etc.  Perhaps even purposefully bad 
grammar in finer points of grammar that most people get wrong - so as to 
keep the "correct" forms from being identifiable.

- Forged user agent / email agent headers

- Never referencing my own _actual_ published works or comments, or 
linking to myself or my work product in even a second-hand manner.

These actions are probably not robust.  My thought is that it can lower my 
common profiles below the noise threshold that a particular aggregator 
might have.

What do _you_ do to sanitize/de-correlate your nyms ?



[1] obnymleakage
[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AOL_search_data_scandal