Here’s the trouble I’m running into. From time to time, commenters on this blog refer to things that indicate that they know things about me that I haven’t posted on this blog. Much of the time, these comments are very helpful and informative, referring to specific laws or real estate opportunities or sales in my state or city. The only thing odd about these comments is that the commenters know what state and city I live in in the first place. For the most part, I’ve figured that these commenters just know me from my message boards or from trading coupons, which was why they knew where I lived. I didn’t worry about it.
But then something new happened. One of these commenters somehow found the new tutoring website I put up, the one which I specifically said on this blog that I wasn’t linking to because it had personal information on it. And once the commenter found that website, he or she contacted me and, under the guise of soliciting my tutoring services, suggested that maybe he or she would come visit me at my house (and mentioned the street on which I live), and said that he or she would come watch me at my church services the next day. The message was oddly worded in order to include personal information about me, and since the person never actually contacted me to inquire about tutoring services, I think that the only point of the message was to frighten me and, I’m afraid that it worked a little.
As I followed the IP address, I noted that I had several commenters with that IP address, and they all shared a couple of characteristics: the comments contained specific references to the state and city in which I lived, and many of them had invalid or nonexistent e-mail addresses. As I said, I had noticed these comments before but I never worried about them until I noted that they shared an IP address with “Star Trek Jimmy,” who offered to come to my house and follow me to church.
So I guess what I’m saying is this:
If you’re from this area and you’ve made a comment that’s specific to where I live and you’re friendly (i.e. not stalking me) I’d sure appreciate you letting me who you are and what comments you’ve made so that I can cross those comments off the “comments made by people who might come kill me” list.
If you fit the above description and you don’t feel like making contact, that’s fine, but don’t be offended if I delete your comments which refer to where I live and/or ignore your helpful advice. Because I’m never sure if that nice person who pointed out a house I might want to buy is, well, a psycho who’s tacitly letting me know that they know not only where I currently live, but also where I’m thinking about moving (and really, could it possibly be a coincidence that I post on a couponing forum about having found a house with certain specs, and then three hours later a reader e-mails me a link that the precise house I had in mind? Of course, if it was you who left that message and you’re actually not a stalker, I’d appreciate you letting me know.)
And, you know, if you live in my area and you read this blog and you want to do lunch, that’d be cool too. You can help me keep an eye out for stalkers.
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I’m not sure where you are from so I don’t know if I’m from your area or not, but it isn’t me. This is a little scary, I agree. Continue to keep tabs on the situation…
I’m stalking you for personal finance information but my technical abilities are limited to finding your blog here every morning on my list of favorites! Although I would love to “do Lunch”…..I’m quite certain I live several time zones away and I just can’t afford the mortgage payments that I would have to make on the gas! I think that “Finding you” is a creepy thing for anyone to do and if they only have good intentions, they will make themselves known. This is the kind of thing that ruins it for those of us that want to mail something fun to you as an appreciation for all of your advice. It prohibits you from sharing something as simple as a mailing address.
I would be seriously freaked out by this! I hope you keep this situation well documented. Is it possible that on the other site you shared your address and some of the info this person shared with you? Maybe if they googled your info from trades and then found the other site that is how the got all of this information about you.
Please keep safe!
YIKES!!
So Sorry you are dealing with this!
Well, I’m stalking you. But you’ve known that for years.
I’m friendly when I’m not being cranky. I have not mailed you any “move here” emails, but I do think you should find a home in Logan.
Cat should come see you. I just don’t know when. And Laura is NOT driving this time.
I hope you find that person. From personal experiences, it may be very difficult to find that person especially if s/he hides behind a proxy server or is cloaked. In my case, the person’s IP address was local. However, the person could have been physically located in China for all I know. Since the person wasn’t personally threatening me or my family, I had to let it go since there was nothing that could be done.
Good luck in finding the stalker! I would be scared, too, if someone knew that much information about me. I have a blog as well and sometimes I worry that someone might know too much information about me. I get scared as much of my information can be found through public sources (cell phone number, address, etc.).
I’m in a big city on the West Coast, which doesn’t sound like where you allude to in your posts (judging by rent and housing prices!) but I wanted to say I’m sorry and I hope that whoever it is backs off. =( How sad that you are on here helping so many of us better our finances and our lives and you end up stalked for it. I mean, I LOVE your blog and all the great advice, but I wouldn’t STALK you – that is insane and very, very sad. Be safe.
Ew, blogstalking is NOT ok. I’m sorry about this, and hope that it stops post-haste. By which I mean to say, I’m not stalking you, but if I were, I’d not know where to begin and I promise I’d be quite friendly and polite about it.
Be careful!
Ugh. I’m sorry this is happening to you. I am not your stalker. I do remember a while back you had a phone number for messages on your site and I googled the area code to see where you lived (mostly because I was jealous of all the better deals you get) but I suppose it is possible that someone else could have done the same thing and had less innocent intentions. I think you could probably contact your local law enforcement to see what your rights are about this situation. I hope you figure it out.
There are specific laws about cyberstalking for each state. I hope this helps!
http://www.haltabuse.org/resources/laws/index.shtml
http://www.wiredsafety.org/cyberstalking_harassment/us_states/us_stalkinglaws_list.html
http://www.ncsl.org/programs/lis/cip/stalk99.htm
I, too, am so sorry you’re having to deal with this. Please take care!
P.S. I’m not your stalker either.