Hacker News Reader

Comment by TulliusCicero | Hacker News Reader

> For one thing, the S.S.C. code prioritizes semantic precision, but Metz—if Alexander’s account is to be taken at its word—had proposed not to “doxx” Alexander but to de-anonymize him.

Oh? From Wikipedia:

> Doxing, or doxxing (from "dox", abbreviation of documents), is the Internet-based practice of researching and publicly broadcasting private or identifying information (especially personally identifying information) about an individual or organization.

Yes, doxxing is normally associated with publishing addresses or phone numbers of people whose real names are already known, but de-anonymizing an anonymous blogger still sounds like a form of it.

View on HN

It seems to me that the level of "privateness" of the information is relevant. Obviously just saying the real name of a famous person who goes by a pseudonym is not considered doxxing. This article claims that his full name "can be ascertained with minimal investigation," and Scott's own blog deletion announcement seemed to agree. Where precisely to draw that line is an area where we can reasonably disagree.

I looked up his name a few weeks ago after the blog was brought down. It took be a couple of days to find it and even then I only found it because I've seen him in person. People here are discussing tracking down his old blog through archive.org, but I didn't think to do that. So, 'minimal investigation' is a relative term.

type "scott alexander slate star codex" into google and his real name, plus several pictures of him are on the first page of the image results.

Alternatively, given that he's made his profession as well as place of residence known, looking for psychiatrists named scott alexander in that region also returns an official result.

If it took you days to figure that out I'm sorry to say you don't have a future as a private eye.

Google is not a static thing.

Results a few weeks ago may be nothing much like results now. (If it took a rando on the internet to point that out to you you don't have ... No let's leave that kind of garbage out, yeah?)

his real identity has been up on the internet for ages, years in fact. He even used to blog under his actual name on less wrong, and has been at public events that he himself organised. Not to mention that as a medical professional that info is obviously going to be online as long as he practises.

If your pseudonym is your actual first and middle name and you're relevant enough to be on the frontpage of google right now you're not being doxed, that's just public information at that point.

The guy republished his own blog posts under his real name in print and online publications. If it's a "secret", it's a very open secret, even from the author himself.

It does take more than a little investigation (or, at least, used to).

It seems the goal lines have been moved to KiwiFarms’ brand of doxxing. As to whose ends that serves, I’ll leave as an exercise to the reader.

Have they? The real name of anyone posting anonymously or under a pseudonym has always been the gold standard of doxxing.

It's usually easy to go from full real name to business and private addresses, emails and phone numbers, especially when the person has a web presence, but also for anyone with a few bucks to spare who's happy to pay a data broker.

> The real name of anyone posting anonymously or under a pseudonym has always been the gold standard of doxxing.

The word "doxx" comes from "documents" because it originally didn't refer to just a name, but an actual document listing out lots of personal information. Everything you mentioned afterwards and more.

Yes. Learning the addresses and phone numbers Is interesting mostly to a few people who want to actively harass the person.

Everyone is hunting for the real name of an anonymous person.

It's particularly easy for Scott as a psychiatrist. The top Google result for his full name is the address and phone number of the clinic at which he works, plus a bio with portrait (he looks exactly like I thought he would) for prospective patients.

> The real name of anyone posting anonymously or under a pseudonym has always been the gold standard of doxxing.

Bronze at best if the pseudonymous person has already told you most of their name, their profession, and where they work.

He's not an anonymous blogger. He's forthcoming with personal information. He's published his full name multiple times (even on his own blog). It's not doxing.

> He's published his full name multiple times (even on his own blog).

I'm almost certain this is untrue. Are you possibly mistaking his pseudonym "Scott Alexander" for this full name? If not, and you understand that Scott and Alexander are his first and middle names, could you please provide a link to an example of where he has published his last name on his blog (or at this point, on the relevant archive.org page)?

Edit: I'm guessing from your comments further down the page that you understand the pseudonym aspect, and have a different conception of "publish" than I do. Do you perhaps mean that he linked or referred to a scientific paper on which he was listed by full name as author? If so, and if true, the strongest I'd probably phrase this is "revealed" rather than "published". If not, and if I'm wrong, and he has directly published his last name on his blog in a manner intended to make it publicly known, I'd like to know so I stop making false claims in the future.

I'm cool with saying "revealed".

I don't want to link directly to it because I think it's kind of an asshole thing to do, but you can find a last name on a bunch of posts on Raikoth.net in archive.org. He reposted most that without the reveal on SSC.

> I don't want to link directly to it because I think it's kind of an asshole thing to do, but you can find a last name on a bunch of posts on

Telling the internet where to find his last name in the comment above was "an asshole thing to do", IMO. Especially given the security concerns mentioned in this article, I just don't see any good coming from making it easier for people to find him in the physical world.

I mean, when someone asked for proof, that seems like a reasonable way to "prove" it.

There are vastly easier ways to find his last name, and even work address, than to (presumably) stumble across a Hacker News comment and then follow my oblique instructions.

OK, I presumed by "his blog" you were referring to Slate Star Codex. Yes, if one includes his earlier internet presences (which I don't think are mentioned in the linked article?) I'm willing to believe he has at times posted his full name, and that if you are willing to dig through some links, you can associate his current writings with those older writings. I think that at some point about a decade ago, as his medical career began, he consciously decided to stop doing this. I'm pretty sure he's been protective enough of his identity since the beginning of SSC that he hasn't published it there. So while one might easily fault his "historical operation security", I think his intent to keep this last name unassociated with SSC was clear and consistent.

That's fair. The only real reason I disagree with you (and probably him) is he _did_ continue to publish personal information. Enough to identify him, even without the last name. If someone repeatedly reveals their own first/middle name, location, and occupation, I think it's silly to call "we'll publish your last name" doxing.

It seems like he might have just freaked out over a series of poor choices and didn't really own up to it. Easier to blame the NYT for "doxing" and do the honorable thing to protect his patients.

Here's a different take. I tried a few times over the last years to figure out his last name, and failed. I didn't spend much time on it, but there was definitely a barrier there. Had the NYT published it, not only would that barrier have disappeared, but a large spotlight would suddenly have been shone on the name, and probably an onslaught of much-higher-profile internet articles about him/it, and quite possibly a large scandal. We're getting a bit of that with things like this New Yorker piece, but it's probably nothing compared to what it would have been if the NYT article had named him and the blog had stayed up. You seem to be arguing that not much would have changed since his name was a poorly kept secret anyhow. I think that has to be wrong. Tons would have changed. There has been a minor avalanche of attention as it is, and probably like a lot of casual readers, I know his name now. But deleting the blog was maybe a good way to prevent the minor avalanche from turning into a major one. Of course, that doesn't mean that his stated reasons for deleting the blog were his real reasons. My thought was that he was looking for an out anyhow and this was a good pretext, though that theory isn't consistent with participating in an NYT profile to begin with (edit: unless he realized partway through the NYT process that it wasn't going to be in his interests to go through with it).

I think you're right about the amount of scrutiny. I think he's pretty firmly a "public figure" now (more deliberately than most), his name is obfuscated at best, and I don't have a problem with the NYT publishing his last name.

I would have a real problem with it if he published under a pseudonym and the NYT were truly doxing him. But I don't think they'd have bothered with his last name at all if he were writing as "Bert Axelrose" or something.

I don't know why you'd say that. I expect they would have handled "Bert Axelrose" exactly the same way. Great name though!

Haha. I just mean it wouldn't have been as immediately interesting. No one would know who "Scott Alexander _______" was. I could be wrong, but knowing the rest of a sequence is more interesting than the name behind a code name (which I'll forget, probably).

I don't follow him, but many of his early blog posts were posted under his full name. He changed that eventually, but it was the case for a while (I say third hand).

I'm unsure if that was before or after the slatestarcodex domain name.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com