<story><title>Columnist asked researchers what they could find out from just his cell number</title><url>https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/15/technology/personaltech/i-shared-my-phone-number-i-learned-i-shouldnt-have.html</url></story><parent_chain></parent_chain><comment><author>skrause</author><text>&amp;gt; &lt;i&gt;A hacker could try to reset my password for an online account by answering security questions like “What is your mother’s maiden name?” or “Which of the previous addresses did you live at?”&lt;/i&gt;&lt;p&gt;That&amp;#x27;s why you don&amp;#x27;t answer those questions honestly. My mother&amp;#x27;s maiden name is always a random 32 character string living in my KeePass database...</text></comment>
<story><title>Columnist asked researchers what they could find out from just his cell number</title><url>https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/15/technology/personaltech/i-shared-my-phone-number-i-learned-i-shouldnt-have.html</url></story><parent_chain></parent_chain><comment><author>dopylitty</author><text>All of the information the &amp;quot;hacker&amp;quot; found using the reporter&amp;#x27;s cell number could have been found using just the reporter&amp;#x27;s name and rough location.&lt;p&gt;It seems strange to me that peoples names, addresses, and phone numbers used to be freely distributed in a large book to every house in town yet now any one of those details can be used to assume someone&amp;#x27;s &amp;quot;identity.&amp;quot; It seems the only thing stopping this from happening en-masse is that nobody has tried.</text></comment>