Etsy’s privacy Valdez: opt-out policy exposes users’ real names and purchase histories – UPDATED – Boing Boing

Etsy, in a move to make their site more Facebook-like, revealed their buyers' real names and shopping histories. People who had shopped for handmade sex toys under fake names now had their shopping history show up on Google searches.

Read brief source…[kot-contrib]. (Thanks, molly.ren!)[/kot-contrib]

Protect your body from airport perverts (travel.msn.co.nz)

Terrorism: it's a threat to more than just national security. It's also a threat to your dignity. Or at least that's what Michael Luongo, spokesperson for a new company called FlyingPasties.com would have you believe. His company sells stripper-style genital covers that cost anywhere from $9.99 for a "generic male bottom" pastie to $29.99 for an "only my husband/wife sees me naked" set in order to obscure the image of a passenger's naked body when going through the newest "virtual strip search" airport security scanners.

"I believe in protecting our rights, in protecting our country," Luongo says in a promo video, "but I also believe in maintaining our dignity." Dignity that could be lost, he says, if you're seen naked. With Flying Pasties, he insists "you don't have to worry about somebody seeing your wife, your girlfriend, your family, or even yourself in naked imagery." That's right: People might know that you're naked under your clothes! But don't worry, capitalism will save us.

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End of gay teen Web site sparks privacy concerns | Privacy Inc. – CNET News

User profiles from the now-defunct XY magazine, which catered to gay teens, are at the center of a serious privacy controversy. Declan McCullagh reports, "In February 2010, XY founding editor Peter Ian Cummings filed a personal bankruptcy petition in federal court[…]. The only significant asset Cummings listed is the 'customer list, personal data, and editorial and back issue files of XY Mag and XY.com.' Cummings says he believes that giving the information to his creditors violates California privacy law and the FTC Act, which prohibits deceptive business practices."

Nevertheless, creditors want this information collected, potentially violating the privacy of up to 1 million gay or questioning teens who subscribed to XY.com. Revealing their information could out them to parents or others. While the question of what to do with a bankrupt Internet company is not new, this is the first time data as sensitive as identifiable details of GLBTQ youth is up for grabs to the highest bidder.

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The First Thing Young Women Do in the Morning: Check Facebook [STUDY]

In a sampling of 1,605 women aged 18-34, 79% of them are fine with kissing in photos, 42% think it’s okay to post photos of themselves intoxicated, and 50% of women believe that it’s just fine to date people they’ve met on Facebook, compared to 65% of men. All this and more according to a recent study released by Oxygen Media and Lightspeed Research, Ben Parr reports for Mashable.com.

Now, I raise my eyebrows at the fact that "49% of women believe it’s fine to keep tabs on a boyfriend by having access to his accounts (42% of men think the same way)." I'm not sure if that means 42% of men feel comfortable having tabs kept on them or if they're keeping tabs on their partners, but it does bring up an obvious question: why aren't more folks simply communicating more honestly? Reassuringly, however, 89% agree that "you should never put anything on Facebook that you don’t want your parents to see." So I guess many people don't mind their parents seeing them drinking. That's pretty chill.

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