Network: Net privacy

If you subscribe to CompuServe, AOL or the Microsoft Network, you can stop them giving out your home address by locating the relevant customer services forum. On AOL, for instance, type in the keyword COS, which stands for "conditions of service". This will take you to an area where you can instruct AOL to remove you from mailing lists that they sell.

Most Web directory services will remove your e-mail address from their listings if you ask them to. The Web addresses of some of the main directory sites are listed below. Also check the search engines to see if you are listed on their "people search" directories.

Finally, there is a service called the Anonymizer, which acts as a kind of privacy filter, standing between you and the rest of the Internet.

Using the Anonymizer, you can visit Web sites and send messages to newsgroups without revealing your e-mail address or other personal information. You can find out about the Anonymizer at http://www.anonymizer.com/. This site includes links to a number of other sites concerned with Internet privacy.

Web Directory Services

Internet Address Finder http://www.iaf.net

Yahoo People Search http://www.yahoo.com/search/ people

WhoWhere? http://www.whowhere.com

BigFoot

http://www.Bigfoot.com

Four11

http://www.Four11.com

Internet Privacy Organisations

Centre for Democracy and Technology

http://www.cdt.org

Electronic Freedom Foundation http://www.eff.org

Electronic Privacy Information Center

http://www.epic.org