Killing privacy with a modem.

• Author: Swartz, Nikki
• Position: News, Trends & Analysis

It used to be that only government agencies and businesses had the resources and manpower to track personal information. But today, the power of the Internet, search engines, and archival databases have combined to enable almost anyone with enough time on their hands to find information about almost anyone else, for any reason.

As a result, people are trying to reduce their electronic presence, and discovering that it is no easy task. Personal privacy has been eroding for a while now, so it should be no surprise that a curious Web surfer, colleague, potential date, or long-lost relative can simply log on to the Internet and find out an individual's address and phone number. But what is surprising--and more than a little frightening--is that individuals cannot remove his or her personal information from the Web.

Of course, much of the personal information that can be found on the Internet is already public, having been printed in newspapers, yearbooks, phonebooks, and on company Web sites. But today, everything from wedding registries to listserv postings are becoming centralized by search engines such as Google.

"Google and its...