Matching Toxic Posts to IP Addresses on Economic's Forum [pdf] (opens in new tab)

> Shortly after introducing this scheme EJMR’s pseudonymous administrator “Kirk” wrote “...for example you can see this post is also from me by looking at the fddf2 on the left. But I’ll give you a million US$ if you can guess my ip.”[2] That IP address—twelve years ago—was almost certainly 188.220.40.122.[3]

I saw some early reactions to this paper that were highly critical of the researchers, and claimed that they were doxxing innocent people.

Without commenting on the substance of the posts to that board, that just seems factually incorrect to me. First, there’s the simple fact that an IP address is not an individual (yeah that’s right EU, I went there). Second, this was quite clever but fundamentally simple analysis of 100% publicly available information.

If I keep posting online various pictures taken from the windows of my house, I don’t think I have any right to get mad when someone geolocates my address.

The EJMR situation appears to be pretty horrific, and also pretty typical. As it's a specific culture (not a general social site like FB or, well, HN) I'm particularly glad it's being called out and investigated.