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Short Survey - Patterns in UserIDs (need help)

N

nitinjindal83

New Member
Joined
Jun 19, 2006
Messages
1
Hi,

My name is Nitin. I am a graduate student at University of Illinois at
Chicago (UIC). I am conducting a few minutes short survey on "Patterns
in Userids" for my research project. We want to study patterns in
usernames or userids created by people when they register on different
websites, etc. I would be really thankful if you could participate in
this short survey. The link is:

http://www.cs.uic.edu/~survey/piu

The survey has been approved by Institutional Review Board of UIC.

I can assure you that this is not a hack or a spam. If you have any
doubts, you can also find the above survey link at the Department of
Computer Science's research page

http://www1.cs.uic.edu/CSweb/public/research.php?audience=public&label=Research

Thanks,
Nitin Jindal
Department of Computer Science
UIC
email: njindal@cs.uic.edu*
 
Looks fake to me! Look at this:

========================================================
C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator>nslookup uic.edu
*** Can't find server name for address 192.168.123.254: Non-existent domain
*** Default servers are not available
Server: UnKnown
Address: 192.168.123.254

Non-authoritative answer:
Name: uic.edu
Address: 128.248.155.51


C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator>nslookup www1.cs.uic.edu
*** Can't find server name for address 192.168.123.254: Non-existent domain
*** Default servers are not available
Server: UnKnown
Address: 192.168.123.254

Non-authoritative answer:
Name: www1.cs.uic.edu
Address: 131.193.32.20


C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator>
========================================================

Seperate IP's...

...Plus, your handle looks nothing BUT suspicious, & why would you be looking for people in a vintage computing forum?
 
Last edited:
Uh, what is the problem with the main site of the University is assigned one series of IP numbers, and the computer science department has a different series? If the computer science department is a fraud website, they put a lot of effort into making it realistic, including names, pictures, phone numbers and email addresses to a 20+ professors.

If you followed the link instead of looking up IP numbers in a broken environment (it seems), you would find contact details of Mr Bing Liu, associate professor and responsible for this survey.

I took the survey, and other than asking which websites I'm frequenting and under which usernames, there was nothing revealing. It is optional to fill in the names of the sites, so if there is a place you'd rather not tell about it is you, don't fill it in. If someone would try to hack my user account (or even email account), they need to know a bit more about me than my username (which in my case in most places equals my last name).
 
Atari, you are out of line. You are accusing this person of being a phisher, and as Carlsson has pointed out, you don't really know what you're talking about.

Please don't do that .. give people the benefit of the doubt, and learn to use the tools correctly.
 
I don't think this is a fake, but I won't join, as the results of this research seem to be aimed at robbing me of more of my privacy.
 
That's a personal decision, and that's fine. It is just posted here, the person probably is not a regular, so any consideration they get is above an beyond what is expected.
 
I'm with Jorg. The poster doesn't give enough info on what the data will ultimately be used for, but surely the results will be published somewhere, where they will find thier way into the hands of advertizers & other propagandists and allow them to tailor & refine thier future spamming efforts.
Or mebbe I'm just paranoid?

--T
 
Then ask for details !?! UIC is a respected institution, and if one of the students pulls any crap they risk a lot.

There is no reason to believe that *YOUR* personal data is going to wind up in report anywhere. The way these things are done is to collect the data and do a statistical analysis on it. Nobody will ever know you participated in the study.

Sure, maybe the final paper might help somebody do something bad. It also might help somebody do something good. I can't imagine seeing spammers and advertisers perusing the ACM and IEEE proceedings at my local library.
 
Oh, I'm not concerned about them gathering personal data, I'm sure most people have enough sense not to enter anything sensitive on to an unfamilliar webpage. The general statistical data is still a powerful tool that may end up in the 'wrong' hands. Data of this sort, even when gathered with the best of academic intentions, can (and will) be used by 'The Hidden Persuaders' to advance thier own agendas.

As for sensitive personal data falling into unfriendly hands, see my recent post in the 'Rants' forum.

--T
 
They will be able to read out how people form their usernames and handles, and whether the usernames depend on which kind of site it is for. Furthermore, they will have a figure how common it is to use one username for every place you visit, and how many people create one-time usernames they never bother about again (like signing in to a site for a one-time posting or otherwise).

If hackers, phreakers or spammers have any use of knowing how common it is to form a username from your real name, so let it be. Maybe those who use completely random usernames will get fewer hacking attempts or spam e-mails after the results are published.

If you are concerned, I suggest contacting somebody responsible for the survey. As mbrutman pointed out, a student mis-using (or selling) survey data for an academic research may be in trouble. If an associate professor would be involved, he's probably kicked out of the academic world forever. I don't know how large economical interests the "dark side" would have to obtain research data of this kind, but I doubt it would be worth giving up your job and be forever blacklisted.
 
I'm not even considering the 'DarkSide', it's the 'WhiteHat' boyz down on Madison Avenue that I choose not to aid the efforts of. Legitimate users of legitimate data can still turn that purely statistical data to thier own (nefarious?) use.

--T
 
Dang guys, just don't click the link. There's no need to go into debate mode. Its a binary choice, click it if you want to, or don't if you don't feel comfortable. Its not like its life and death here, its just a survey.

-VK
 
vlad said:
Dang guys, just don't click the link. There's no need to go into debate mode. Its a binary choice, click it if you want to, or don't if you don't feel comfortable. Its not like its life and death here, its just a survey.

-VK
Click to expand...

But...but...but...I love debate! It's my way of life. If I don't exercize my grey-matter occaisionally, I'm afraid it might just shrivel up & die.

--T
 
In my >15 years on daNet (& various local bb systems), I have used only a small handfull of aliases, depending on what I was up to at the time (one of my favorite avatars was a 23-year-old blonde-haired, blue-eyed lesbian named 'Natas', back in the day when it was still 'fun'). These dayz, I, like carlsson, have the confidence to appear as my 'real' self most of the time, since I believe that I have built up enough of a reputation to have little to worry about, therefore, data on my handles would be of very little interest anyways.

--T
 
Terry Yager said:
But...but...but...I love debate! It's my way of life. If I don't exercize my grey-matter occaisionally, I'm afraid it might just shrivel up & die.

--T
Click to expand...

Lord, protect me from the temptation to spike this big volleyball, which is hanging in midair and just waiting for an easy one-liner to send it back down hard.

(Fighting the urge to talk about what's left of Terry's brain ...) :)
 
Well, if there was a site where I played the role of a 23 year old white trash lesbian, I would probably want to keep it a secret (unconnected to my other 'net profile) and not mention it in this survey.
 
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