Getting doxxed can be scary and frustrating. Learn doxxed’s meaning, why doxxing wrong, and how to avoid it in your own life.
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Kevin
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January 19, 2022
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If you’ve been online over the past several years, you’ve likely heard about doxxing, doxers, getting doxxed, or other similar words and phrases. Doxxed is a highly relevant term in the modern world of personal data, social media, and online privacy. Being doxxed is something that many people fear and for a good reason.
This is what it means to dox someone, where the word comes from, and why you should avoid being doxxed at all costs. This word is becoming more relevant every day, so learning how to understand and use it is extremely important!
What Does Dox Mean?
Dox is a verb that refers to searching for and publicly publishing the private personal info of a real person on the internet. This is often done by hackers and criminals as a form of harassment against people that they don’t like.
In many cases, hackers take private information like contact information, social security numbers, financial information, home addresses, criminal history, and phone numbers and put them online for anyone to access.
In many cases, doxxing someone is used as a revenge tactic or overtly aggressive action against someone. However, doxxing is highly illegal and can result in law enforcement and local police involvement.
Retaining the ability to have anonymity online is incredibly important. Having your privacy forcibly taken away by someone online is a severe offense due to the danger and confusion it incurs on the victim.
Where Does the Word Dox Come From?
The word dox has its origin in other words in the English language.
One common way that many people refer to their own personal information is their “documents.” When being concise, the word documents is commonly shortened to the slang term docs. The word dox was born because of the phonetic similarities between the words docs and dox.
When someone’s personal information or “docs” are leaked online, it is called being doxxed.
How Can You Avoid Getting Doxxed?
Getting doxxed and being the victim of a doxing attack online can be a terrifying situation. Doxing is sometimes used to send anonymous death threats and often interferes with their IRL lives.
Luckily, there are a few ways to ensure that you, your real identity, and your privacy are well protected.
Install a VPN on Your Computer
A VPN is the first and often one of the most effective lines of defense against hackers getting access to your personal information online. A VPN is a virtual private network that protects your IP addresses from anyone trying to access them. It can be easily used without changing your ISP (internet service provider).
Be Careful on Social Media
The improper usage of social media accounts is one of the most common ways people get doxxed. Maintaining your safety on those websites is absolutely critical to your online security.
Social media platforms like Instagram, YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter are susceptible to doxxers. Make sure that you never publicly share any personal information on your social media profiles, and ensure you know how to properly use your privacy settings.
Create Strong Passwords
Having an individual password for every website is one of the best ways to protect against data breaches and doxxing. If you have any websites or accounts that share passwords, it’s essential to change them.
If you don’t want to remember tons of passwords, try looking for a password manager that will help you remain safe online without changing your login habits.
Be Aware of Data Breaches
This is one of the most common ways people have their personal information, username, passwords, and credit card numbers stolen. Sometimes, hackers can gain access to the entire database of a website.
When this happens, your information can fall into the hands of the wrong people without any mistakes or carelessness on your part. Always be on the lookout for signs that there may have been a data breach on a website. If this is ever in question, the answer is likely on Google.
Keep Your Information as Private as Possible
A lot of the time, doxxing is done simply because of a minor mistake that left someone vulnerable. While the victim of doxxing is never at fault for their own misfortune, it is still important to take the proper precautions to protect yourself from online attacks.
A few key things to remember in online interactions are:
- Only share personal information during private correspondence with people and companies you absolutely know and trust.
- Never interact with websites that are data brokers.
- Don’t engage with anyone else’s private information without their express consent.
- Block and report any unknown account or entity trying to get access to your personal information.
- Keep any vital information like your social security number, home address, phone number, and financial information off of the internet if at all possible.
Examples of the Word Dox in Real World Conversation
Using words in their proper context is all about seeing terms being appropriately used. Here are some example sentences that use the phrase dox so that you can know how to use it in its proper context!
- I saw an article written by some journalists about how they were doxxed and how scary it was.
- A random person threatened to dox me if I didn’t give them my voter registration. I called the local police, and they took care of it.
- I read online that data broker sites are often one of the most dangerous websites for doxing people.
- Even though the person on my Instagram said he wanted my home address so he could meet my pets, I could tell he was just trying to dox me.
- I almost posted some screenshots online containing my home address — I’m glad I double-checked before posting!
Remember to protect yourself from doxxing and stay up-to-date on relevant online terms!
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