SKIRMISHER

If the search data AOL “accidentally” made public are any indication, the web is indeed a festering pool of the darkest aspects of human character.

The data contained over 20 million search queries performed by more than 650,000 AOL users, and although only user-ID numbers were revealed and no names or addresses, many of the searches were chilling clues to the personal situations of the people who performed them.

Is a user repeatedly searching for information on “how to kill a wife” not disturbing enough? Multiply that kind of shit to tens of thousands, and you get the bleeding picture.

A CNET report sifted the data and picked out particular bone-chilling users, like AOL user 9486162, who on April 26 made these searches:

university of kentucky football
hold’em poker school
ways to kill yourself
suicide by natural gas
how to kill oneself by natural gas
assisted suicide
suicide by overdosing
how long does carbon monoxide poisoning take to kill a person
over dose ways to commit suicide
university of kentucky 2007 football recruits
texas hold’em poker on line seminars
employment needed- louisville ky

My favorite is AOL user 2708, apparently a really angry woman, who seemed to have spent three months scheming to get back at her ex:

revenge tactics
the woman’s book of revenge
dirty tricks for chicks
voice changer
how to humiliate someone
bill me pay later for cd’s
scams to play on people
how to get revenge on an old lover
i hate my ex boyfriend
how to really make someone hurt for the pain they caused to someone else
columbia house
advice from women who have seeked revenge on old lovers
makehimsuffer.com
how to say goodbye hurtfully
how to report child neglect in the state of new hampshire
free articles on gay life that can be mailed to me
free christian things
free gay magazines
free angry stuff to send to an ex lover
how to permanently delete information from your hard drive
makehimpay.net
women’s harley davidson boots
www.match.com
the worst thing to send someone via email
thong dancewear
locatecell.com
what can i do to an old lover for revenge
mean revenge tactics
death records in hampstead new hampshire

But apart from this fuzzy glimpse into the lives of faceless, anonymous people is the fact that AOL just committed the search engine version of bending over and fucking oneself in the ass, holyshit style. There is going to be a stinky, bloody fallout.

AOL’S DISTURBING GLIMPSE INTO USERS’ LIVES [CNN]

AOL APOLOGISES FOR REVEALING USERS’ SEARCH DATA [New Scientist]

[Image by Saul]

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