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Comment by lisper | Hacker News Reader

I write a blog. One of the most popular kinds of articles I used to post was travelogues, until I realized that I was pretty much advertising to the entire world that I was away from home. That wouldn't be so bad except for the fact that it is also trivial to find out where my home is.

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So you think that burglars are:

  1. Searching through travelogues
  2. Waiting for one where a person is actively posting
  3. Assume that the blogger is still traveling
  4. Researching where that person lives
  5. Hoping they happen to be close by
  6. Hoping no one else lives there/is house sitting/is renting while you're out

Rather than

1. Driving around looking for a place with a bunch of mail overflowing from the mail box and packages piled on the doorstep or some high value target visible through a window, regardless of knowing what the address is of the house

The good news is you're worried about nothing. However, adding a layer of abstraction to an address won't help curb burglaries.

A layer of abstraction to your address would make it easier to stop or redirect all deliveries while you're out. This would completely prevent burglaries based on piled up packages and mail.

This is largely a solved problem. Have your mail held (admittedly you can only do this for up to 30 days in the US). And just don't order anything else that will potentially arrive while you're away.

At least some of the major package carriers in the US offer package-holds.

Assuming that putting a hold on the layer of abstraction is no harder than putting a hold on your mail, what you're describing is harder than it would be with the abstraction layer. It's also less effective, as it doesn't handle packages sent by other people, unexpected delays in shipping, or unplanned trips.

So is a friend or neighbour who stops by once a day to feed the plants, water the cats, and empty the mailbox.

I always hesitate before posting travel updates on social media, and make sure it's only visible to friends. Probably paranoid, but it makes me feel better to not live with the added risk of entire the world being able to know my house is empty.

You are overlooking that burglars often have interests outside of burglary.

The scenario where his blog could get him burgled is not burglars who set out to identify targets by reading travelogues. It is a burglar who happens to read the blog because he finds it interesting and happens to recognize that he is being presented with a burglary opportunity.

I think an enterprising hacker might get it into their heads that there could be profit to be made by systematically searching blogs for travelogues and inferring that their authors might be away, and then selling that information to interested local parties.

Why not just post the travelogue after you return?

Because that reduces the narcissistic supply

For the same reasons that newspapers don't publish week-old news.

News outlets do publish several days old "news" though.

I think the reader feels like it matters but it doesn't. If someone is "writing from $place" it seems more immediate, more authentic, more real? When really it wouldn't matter for most situations.

My travelogues were not just reviews of places, they were often timely pieces about current events in those places. And my trips often last for a very long time.

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