Hacking Human

This article was pretty interesting and shed a new light on hacking for me. I did not realize that hacking actually was rooted way back in the 1950's. In the article, the term "grave digging" is sort of a creepy way of thinking about social hacking but considering what is involved it is a fitting term. The way social hacking is explained, makes it easier for me to picture how it happens.
After reading the article, social hacking seems to me, to involve creativeness, by sifting through information on the internet to paint a picture of a certain human or group. The scary thing is what kind of picture are they painting?
There seems to be much information on the internet that really does not need to be “hacked”. Even I could do it! Access to phone numbers and maps, for example, are available to the public. I admit I sometimes use 411 to look up someone or if an unknown number called my phone. But I do not feel comfortable that this information can be accessed by anyone. With the popularity of Blogs a lot of information can be found out about an individual. However, one can choose what they want to post on their Blog and can choose what information they want others to see. It is frightening to know that there are no tools available to determine whether you are being watched. When I think of a "watcher", I think of an overweight middle aged man, with thick glasses sitting in a dark room all day at his computer “watching” people snickering to himself. That is just a picture that has been painted in my head of a hacker or a watcher through media representations or such. Just thought I would add that little tidbit.
Before taking this course it is sad how oblivious, trusting and unaware I was to these things going on around me. I think perhaps I liked it better when I had no clue. Less paranoia and stress!