Idiot Rob and his broadcast receipts
Thursday, October 28, 2010 at 09:58PM I’ve got lots more like these…
Today I finally got around to claiming money for some work that I did ages ago. (Actually, the results of the work have just been published here) . As part of the claims process Microsoft, not unreasonably, likes to see receipts of all the things I bought, including food and bits and bobs. So, I did what I usually do, which is make up a zip archive of all the relevant paperwork and put it on SkyDrive for Microsoft to read. This is not particularly confidential, so I just made a folder, dropped the file into it, emailed the link and thought nothing more of it.
Turns out this was really stupid. I forgot that lots of things out there are watching what I do and then sharing that information with lots of other people, including folks on Facebook. I got a message last night that the file was visible and that Facebook had told all my friends about it. I changed the protection so nobody could see it any more, but of course there are by now thousands of copies of the file out there on the web, and probably even a video on YouTube.
There’s nothing in the file that anyone couldn’t find out about me by doing a simple search of my name (apart from some aspects of my eating habits I guess) but I guess this is a salutary lesson to anyone who uses the cloud on a regular basis that if you want to keep thinks private, you should mark them private. Security through obscurity was never really an option, and with this kind of “auto publicity” it is now even less of one.
Rob
Turns out that this is easy to fix:
- Go to your Windows Live Messenger Social page so that you can see the item you didn't want to put there.
- Click the "gears" icon in the top right of the offending item to open the "Options" menu.
- Select "More Options" from the menu.
- On the page that appears next, clear the tickbox in "Updates about shared documents on SkyDrive"
- Click Save.
No more updates about saved files.
Life
Reader Comments (4)
If you are in the area and looking for a burger next time I'd highly recommend Red Robin. It's primarily a sit down restaurant but they also do to-go orders. My favorites are the Banzai burger (burger marinaded in teriaki sauce with cheese, lettuce, tomato and grilled pineapple) or the Blue Ribbon (grilled burger, blue cheese crumbles, tangy steak sauce, lettuce and deep fried onion straws).
P.F. Changs has great Chinese food but the best restaurant at that mall, in my opinion, is The Cheesecake Factory. As you'd expect the cheesecake is good but the real reason to go there is the awesome main menu. There is tons of choice (my favorite is the Bang Bang Chicken and Shrimp) and great presentation. To me The Cheesecake Factory exemplifies the best of American chain restaurants, lots of choice, consistently good quality and friendly but efficient service.
If you do go and it's busy (and always ask at the front desk, the crowd size isn't always a reliable indicator as a table for 2 or 4 will often slip in front of bigger groups) ask if you can sit in the bar, the wait for tables is almost always significantly less than the main restaurant (and you don't have to drink alcohol, bar wait staff actually like diners as the total bill and thus their tip is often larger than somebody having a couple of beers).
Finally, good luck getting < $50 notes from foreign exchange places in the UK. In the years that I traveled to the US it was like pulling teeth to get them to break more than one $50 apart for me. The most reliable way I found was to wait and get money out of a cash machine in the US. ATMs dispense nothing greater than $20 notes and your regular cash point card will likely work (look for a Star, Plus etc. logo).
I have at least one MacDonalds whenever I go travelling. I've been to MacDonalds, in Paris, Warsaw, Milan and lots of places in the 'states. I'm always impressed by the way that their food tastes the same everywhere in the world...