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NOTICE: Facebook And Google Indexing Your Firearm Serial Numbers

mikeyp

mikeyp

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Wouldn't this be illegal?

NOTICE: Facebook And Google Indexing Your Firearm Serial Numbers

Google and Facebook have now made it possible to find photos of firearms by simply typing a serial number into the search box. Earlier today, the automotive website Jalopnik published a story showing how license plate numbers are evidently scanned using optical character recognition (OCC) on Google images, allowing them to be searchable using text queries. Using the OCC hypothesis, TFB wondered if this image data mining technique might be able to be used to search for firearm serial numbers. Using images posted previously on TFB with serial numbers displayed on firearms, we tested the serial number search technique. As you can see from the results below, firearm serial numbers are in fact part of this apparent large-scale data mining operation by companies like Google and Facebook.

Glock_Search-660x378.jpg


It appears Google, with the help of Facebook, is archiving this information and making it easier to aggregate. In order to further test this theory, I tried a different serial number, this time from a silencer review. Placing the search term in quotes, Google is forced to search for only that specific character string. Here are the results.
Silencer_Search-660x404.jpg


Facebook and Google are Reading and Cataloging Your Firearm Serial Numbers. If you’re an avid TFB reader, you might have read our article about how we’re not concerned about posting firearms serial numbers. However, this does not mean that we should be complacent in the information that we share being controlled or censored.

It’s clear that the firearms community is not being singled out by this data mining operation. And no, you as an individual cannot readily lookup someone’s personal information with only firearm serial numbers. Regardless of this, Instagram is owned by Facebook, and YouTube is owned by Google. As both of these companies are privately owned, but heavily relied upon, the knowledge of this publicly available data mine is unsettling.

Earlier this year, our Instagram account was deleted with seemingly no explanation. TFB has been able to restore the account, but a clear explanation was never provided as to why it was deleted.

806DFD53-9308-43B5-A61E-F42C93ABBE46.jpeg


This serial number was obscured when it was loaded in to TFB for the story.

8064B81D-0C51-4E7B-A811-164C4D84D4A3.jpeg
 
BUMPA01603 said:
Technically NES forums is a form of social media
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So are Reddit and 4chan and other discussion avenues, but I draw a distinction between these and what is commonly referred to as a social media network. Social media networks (Facebook, Twitter, YouTube to an extent, etc...) are, for the most part, an extension of your actual identity with no ambiguity. Forums such as this and Reddit are pseudo-anonymous and thus what we feel like we can say, do say, and talk about can be markedly different than on a social media network.
 
I dont do any social media such as facebook or twitter or the like. Dont make it too easy for the tyrants who will have access to data that Hitler and Stalin would have been sooo delighted to have.

RIFLEMAN1000 said:
Or simply don't use social media for anything. Social media is the plague that no one will talk about.
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wilson911 said:
Hahahahahahahanahanaha.......thanks for that. I needed a good laugh today.
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Why start an argument when there is no need? Usually when someone responds solely with laughter, it's because they don't understand or don't have an actual position from which to argue. Unless you want to debate me on why my statement that forums are pseudo-anonymous is correct (which it is)?
 
crispnipz said:
Why start an argument when there is no need? Usually when someone responds solely with laughter, it's because they don't understand or don't have an actual position from which to argue. Unless you want to debate me on why my statement that forums are pseudo-anonymous is correct (which it is)?
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You wrote something stupid and now want to troll me?? Lol. That's almost as funny as you believing that's theres even a scintilla of anonymity on reddit or nes.

I have had a long day. Your humor is appreciated, but I'm not looking to waste my time arguing with someone who doesnt understand anonymity online. So I will have to check out now. (Still chuckling...)
 
I've never particualy cared or understood the reasoning for covering serials. Most serials are predictable, and most arent numbered in a random fashion. With basic serial scheme knowledge a person could recreate a genuine serial for the correct type of firearm without any problems.

crispnipz said:
Why start an argument when there is no need? Usually when someone responds solely with laughter, it's because they don't understand or don't have an actual position from which to argue. Unless you want to debate me on why my statement that forums are pseudo-anonymous is correct (which it is)?
Click to expand...

He's right. NES isn't private. And we as users shouldn't expect privacy. The owner of this forum has to face consequences if he doesn't cooperate with a legit request for information regarding a user. Sure, we could post here using VPNs and register with weird emails that were also made with VPNs, but I suspect very few people are doing that.

Back when NES was in its circus days and us old studs were young hot animals people were and did get in trouble for things posted on NES. There are a lot of police in the area who have nothing better to do than give people hard times for bashing their force on social media. Christ, most of the things I post on this forum are violations of my works draconian social media policy, nevermind legit legal scenarios that have played out.
 
They say there's no registry but the ATF and the FBI sure find out pretty quick where a gun was sold and to who.
 
Lol. Your phone can be used to continuously record. Even if you never have taken a pic of your guns, any app with access to your phone camera could record them. Do you put your phone in an ammo can before you ever take a gun out? Do you stop others from taking pics when you shoot?
 
wilson911 said:
You wrote something stupid and now want to troll me?? Lol. That's almost as funny as you believing that's theres even a scintilla of anonymity on reddit or nes.

I have had a long day. Your humor is appreciated, but I'm not looking to waste my time arguing with someone who doesnt understand anonymity online. So I will have to check out now. (Still chuckling...)
Click to expand...


See, this is exactly the kind of smug, unfounded arrogance that really pisses me off. I'm a software developer, specializing in web-based applications, bud, so let me give you a little bit of a lesson, in terms of English, the TCP/IP protocol, and US law with regard to internet anonymity vis-à-vis internet websites which allow the posting of user-generated content.

Most forums, including this one and including Reddit, do not any require personal information to register nor post. Of course you could say that they require an email address, which is true, but creating email addresses and creating accounts on forums can be done in a way which is not tied to your real-life identity. If you want to remain completely and utterly anonymous, a hardened strategy I could think of would be, using a pseudonym, contacting someone you know online only, who resides in a different country, to buy you access to a foreign VPN service, which you chain behind an onion-routing network such as Tor, to post. Doing all that--and believe me there are many other steps that could be taken--it would be quite difficult, nigh almost impossible unless you make a mistake, to reveal your identity. That's anonymity.

But of course that is outside the scope of what we're talking about, because the example I described above would likely only be necessary if you were using anonymity to commit illegal activity, and unpopular opinions are still legal in this country for the time being. A notable case study related to a failed attempt to stay anonymous online to commit illegal activity is that of Dread Pirate Roberts, the operator of the original prolific dark web drug marketplace Silk Road. He followed many aspects of the example I laid out above, but he allowed his actual identity to intermingle with his hidden identity, which led to his arrest and imprisonment.

When I make the point about forums generally being pseudo-anonymous, which they are, I am talking about, broadly, discussing things that are legal (but perhaps controversial). Notice that, from the beginning, I have included the word "pseudo" because it is very difficult to attain true anonymity when posting on internet websites. For most cases though, people cannot ascertain your identity through a handle. I could register a Reddit username such as "flippybunghole" which has never been associated in any way with my real-life identity, and unless I make references to my occupation/location/etc...things that reveal my real-life identity, the only realistic ways to attain this information would be:

1. The site administration taking steps to de-anonymize me
2. Law enforcement compelling the site administration to de-anonymize me

In the first scenario, this can happen if the site administration doesn't like you. In the second scenario, it would almost certainly only happen if you post something illegal.

So we've covered that, unless you post something illegal, the site owners don't like you, or you slip up, you can remain generally anonymous on these types of sites. Now as a rebuttal to my own arguments here, I would like to point out an extremely unlikely, but possible scenario which combines 1 and 2 above. Suppose the site administrators really don't like you. Since they have full control over the forum, including the database in which these posts are stored, they could, in theory, edit the database and change the content of your posts to something illegal, like a threat to a government official, and then report the threat, which may result in your identity being revealed via a law enforcement visit to your residence. A less serious example of this actually did occur when the bitch-ass admin of reddit edited the post of a user who was critical of him to say something else. So again, this is an extremely unlikely scenario, but one I wanted to point out to avoid appearing disingenuous.

Now with respect to the scenario of the site owner revealing information about you, the only information they generally have that isn't already publicly available is: IP address(es) you have posted from, and on some sites, your email address. With respect to an email address, if that is not tied to your real identity, it is a dead-end unless law enforcement is after you. And in the former case, unless you can compel the ISP to reveal the personal information of the account holder who that IP was assigned to at the time the post was made, which you could only do if you have a valid law enforcement request (such as a warrant), or you work for the ISP and don't care about getting fired, you would not be able to prove identity. And even then, you still couldn't in theory, positively prove who made the post(s), because an IP address, under current US case law, does not necessarily boil down to a person. At best, the IP address can be inferred to belong to (leased to) the account holder at the ISP, but if you live with multiple people using different devices on your network, who is to say who posted what? But, to compare theory to practice, what would likely happen in the case of an illegal post would be a raid of the home of the account holder associated with the IP address, confiscation of electronic equipment, and interrogation and forensic analysis to determine who posted what, but again, making illegal posts is beyond the scope of this discussion.

All of this is moot anyway because we are solely talking about posting with pseudo-anonymity and its contrast to posting with real-life identity. Again, if my real name is Tim Smith, I might not want to let on that I am an avid collector of AR-15s or perhaps don't fully support the LGBTQIAAP+ agenda on a site where I'm using my real identity (like Facebook) for fear of repercussions such as loss of employment. But if I post those opinions as flippybunghole on a forum, I do not generally need to fear those repercussions. That is one of the benefits of pseudo-anonymity, which is something I hope you understand the meaning of now.

I don't mean to be rude, but you were quite childish and were trying to talk down to me about a matter which you clearly do not understand to the degree I do. I have been a software engineer a lot longer than I've been a firearm owner. I would never talk down to you about guns because I reckon you know more about guns than me. So return the favor and don't talk down to me about this subject.

Dench said:
He's right. NES isn't private. And we as users shouldn't expect privacy.
Click to expand...

This would be a salient point, but you are conflating privacy with anonymity, which are not the same things. Privacy is the prevention of others being aware of something. I shower in a windowless bathroom with a locked door. I am naked and nobody sees my nakedness. That is privacy. Anonymity, by contrast, is when others are aware of something, but don't or can't know who is responsible. I post on reddit as flippybunghole calling Elizabeth Warren "Chief Shitting Bull" in reference to her lying about her race. Others see the deed, but do not know who did the deed. That is anonymity.

Dench said:
The owner of this forum has to face consequences if he doesn't cooperate with a legit request for information regarding a user. Sure, we could post here using VPNs and register with weird emails that were also made with VPNs, but I suspect very few people are doing that.
Click to expand...

These are all points that I address above, admittedly while still writing this post when you had posted this. But none of these points invalidate what I am saying about how anonymity and pseudo-anonymity on the internet work. And good for website administrators who comply with lawful user information requests. There is a line between posting an unpopular opinion and posting something illegal.

Dench said:
Christ, most of the things I post on this forum are violations of my works draconian social media policy, nevermind legit legal scenarios that have played out.
Click to expand...

You have succinctly summarized my original point: You are enjoying one of the benefits of pseudo-anonymity; you do not fear your co-workers finding out what you post because we only know you as your username. That is the difference between forums and "social media."
 

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