MN no longer safe for gender critical women

[TheXXFactor]

I am reluctantly deleting my MN account, in light of the data breach: www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3225517-The-MNHQ-Moderation-team

It's a fantastic site, Justine has shown herself to be a staunch defender of women and I'm enormously grateful to MNetters for all your support and humour over the years. So this isn't a flounce, more a reluctant slink out of the door of a party while the gin is still flowing but...

..this data breach could cost me my job and my personal safety. I have no way of knowing whether Emma has stolen my data and MN don't seem interested in finding out. They are not even reporting the breach to the ICO.

I hate doing this. I hate that trans extremists will see this as a victory. But I cannot trust MN to keep my data safe, or even to take proper steps to remedy a breach. I sincerely hope that they will review their approach, so I can come back. Until they do, the anonymity of usernames means nothing and every gender critical woman on here is at risk.

So long and thanks for all the Pom bears

@TheXXFactor Please don't. After Jeffrey I changed all my profile details to make them anonymous. You can do the same and keep posting.

MN is a very important site for women's consciousness raising, not just for awareness of any particular class structure. Please Keep On Keeping On!!!

Sorry, bad phrasing there! I'm in the middle of fibre fog so can only remember snatches and putting words together is quite a challenge!

There was a site, possibly for the Jennifer Jones (?) AWS challenge where people were getting weird emails after signing up. I'll have a look see if I can find any more.

Sorry - it was gofundme. I was close!

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3144275-Urgent-Ive-had-a-phishing-email-re-my-donation-to-gofundme?pg=1&order=

Staying too. AngryAttackKitten, LangCleg and thebewilderness taught me to be a feisty bitch (look, I'm even cussing)

So nope, not backing down here either, screw 'em!

OP, I hope you'll stay or come back under another name.

Together we are strong

Full disclosure:

Yes, I am a Cerf, and apologies to Light, I sometimes drink fruit tea

Perhaps this is a good opportunity for posters to review the personal data they unwittingly share on line, not just on Mumsnet, but across the board. Register with false details if possible. Give the minimum data requested. I have walked away from some websites because they have required what I considered unnecessary personal information.

I have FB and Twitter accounts so I can read posts if necessary, but they're not in my real name and I use a different anonymous email address. I would never post personal photos of me or my family online.

Companies can never offer a 100% guarantee that your data will be safe, so it seems prudent to be careful about what you store online/in the cloud. We need to take responsibility for keeping ourselves safe too.

She really does have a lot to answer for. One thing (not sure if it’s reassuring) is that I do think some of this is pure stupidity on Emma’s part. If she had actual names and emails, I think her blog post would have looked very different.

But the point is nobody knows which is why I think MN should take legal action and get an injunction against her and an order to search all devices that she has. They can surely afford it.

I'm staying. My friends and colleagues would be surprised if I didn't think that for nearly all women being a woman meant being genotypically and phenotypically female.

I'm staying too. I refuse to be scared off by the TRAs.

Sorry to see you go.

I am going to stick around, although likely under a new account with no identifying details, and via a VPN.

I imagine my work wouldn’t insta-sack me for having gender critical views - but it probably would broadly fall under attracting negative attention to the company, regardless of whether the views themselves are right or wrong.

:( , in short. I’ve talked about my disability, my marriage, bad former relationships, my job under this username. If it gets linked to my real name (which is part of the email address I provided on signup, as I believe in personal accountability), there is a very real possibility of real life rebound.

Pretty daft of anyone to use their real name and email address to be honest.

Maybe so. I did because I am (was) happy for the moderators to know who I was. It adds a layer of accountability. While I don’t want to go full public gendercrit because of work implications, I stand by everything I’ve posted.

That was on the understanding that the data wouldn’t be stolen and splashed over the Internet, though. I will be smarter and less trusting in future.

Pretty daft of anyone to use their real name and email address to be honest.

Some people signed up 10 years ago when there wasn't this huge risk of data breaches. I don't think it's daft- MN make a fortune out of presenting themselves as this friendly and safe platform. If they are dumb enough to not have proper procedures in place to avoid this sort of thing happening, the blame lies at their feet, not the users.

Agree with susans last post

And thank you very much bewilderness

Maybe MN needs to be more savvy in its recruitment process? EH is easily found online and claims she is a 'LGBT activist'. I'm not sure self-confessed activists - of any persuasion - are a wise bet when it comes to working on a forum such as this.

As much as I appreciate the stance MN takes on the feminism boards, they really must report this breach to the commissioner.

I'm not going anywhere but I would like to de reg and register under a different email address. Would they count that as socking?

rufus don't leave!!! Please?

I had to dereg and get all my posts pulled off a previous account after a TRA screenshot me and posted on Twitter. I was worried about being identifiable from my posting history.

I'm more careful about what i post now.

Some people signed up 10 years ago when there wasn't this huge risk of data breaches

Yes, like me. When it became clear this wasn't sensible I changed my login details. It's not hard really.

I’ve started using proton mail, it’s secure and absolutely anonymous. Tunnel bear is a good vpn.
I fully support those of you who can’t risk being outed, I have nothing to lose and dgaf but am still wary due to DD being a teacher.

quentin

I am always on mumsnet

Hours!!!

I couldnt figure out why the tradesman was wandering round the house yesterday

IT WAS MY SON!!

He was 8 the other day...when did he get taller than me????

But I can't leave now...im too bloody contrary

I work in a university, we have a very strong trans inclusive policy and a very 'woke' culture. I was worried and angry to find myself on LM's 'terf list' (I clicked the link on here and was astonished to find my full name on it, despite never tweeting LM). I'd almost forgotten about it when I was in my boss' office last week to collect something and she looked up from her computer and said "I'm on that odious little prat's list too, we're in good company - there are some great women on that list".

I was amazed, she was incredibly 'woke' herself a year ago and voted for a transwoman to hold a woman's position on campus (TW went nuclear when they didn't get the position, so that could have been the start of her change of heart). Anyway, my fear of being 'outed' ended up being unfounded, more and more people are seeing this for what it is.

Also, just as an aside - every time I go into town I put leaflets in the women's changing areas, just outlining the stark reality of the consequences of self id with details of Amy's petition. I've only been questioned once, and when I explained it she said "Oh my God, you go ahead". Things are changing.

I’ve deregged and re regged - I have a good reason (family member who cannot know where I live) and I’m pretty sure MNHQ had enough info to put that together if a full user data breach occurred. I can’t take the risk of this person finding me. My previous posts still stand.