Good morning everyone!

I've said this before, but it has popped up again as an issue, so I felt it fair to give everyone a fair warning.  If you, as a provider or hobbyist, are NOT using a burner phone number, and you have entered you phone number in Facebook, and not set the ability for people to search for you through Friends Only, then you can be found!  Your real identity, if you will.  For hobbyists, perhaps not as big a deal as providers.  Steps to take to protect your privacy -

1.  In Facebook, go to Settings - Privacy.  There are two questions for "Who can look me up"?  You can be searched for in the top bar by either email address or phone number.  For each of these questions you have three choices - "Friends", "Friends of Friends", and "Everyone".  Obviously, if you use your personal email or phone for hobbying on either side, set these to friends.
2.  Remove your phone number from your Facebook profile.  I don't have any phone, personal or hobby, on mine, because everyone I would want to call me or text me already has my number.
3.  Create a hobbying profile under your ailas that include your hobby email and / or hobby number
4.  The above step requires a burner phone of some kind.  And by the way, Google Voice makes for an EXCELLENT burner if you have an iPhone, or even an Android (though it's a bit more difficult on an Android to keep multiple Google accounts totally seperate in apps since they're all baked into the OS) - it's just an app that can make free phone calls and texts through a toss-away number and an app, no charge per call or text.  You can associate a cell phone with it at first and then delete the cell phone, and then if you need to "disappear" so to speak, you need simply delete the Voice account, then the Google account as a whole.  What PD will go through the trouble and expense of subpoenaing both Google and ISP to try and track you down (which is the only way it could be done)?  The expense and time would outweigh the potential fines.

Please people - in 2015, privacy is rapidly disappearing.  Know how it all works, and know how to protect yourself.  America doesn't have Europe's "right to be forgotten", so keep whatever privacy you can scramble together.