Invisible Privacy | Online Privacy

The absolute best way to hide your identity and protect your privacy is to use a nominee. A nominee is someone who acts on your behalf. For example:

1. To hide your identity with a bank, you have nominee Sally open a bank account under her own name, using her SSN but giving the bank your ghost address along with an untraceable phone number. She then signs a stack of checks and gives them all to you. From that moment on, you have total control of the bank account and can use it to mail in deposits and write checks. In fact, the bank can be in some state across the country from where you really live.

2. To hide your identity when renting a storage unit, you have nominee Ricardo rent the unit in the name of a New Mexico LLC. Ricardo signs the contract as owner of the company. He then gives you the key to the unit along with a bill of sale showing he sold the LLC to you. (Date this bill of sale sometime after the rental date.)

3. To hide your identity when ordering cable television, use nominee Pedro when you call in the order. Have Pedro on hand when the installer comes. He will be the one who signs the contract. You will have thus hidden your identity from PIs who often start any search with an informant inside the local cable company!

In my book How to be Invisible, there is a complete chapter on the use of nominees. Other chapters deal with ghost addresses and LLCs from New Mexico. To encourage you to order this book, I am making the following offer, valid until December 31, 2009.

Order a new How to be Invisible book on Amazon.com and send Amazon's e-mail confirmation to me at JJL [at} canaryislandspress.com. I will then send you a free copy of my e-report How to Locate a Trustworthy Nominee.

IN ADDITION, I will also offer you serious discounts on both New Mexico LLCs, and ghost addresses in Canada, Alaska or Spain. These discounts will be valid until December 31, 2009. You may end up saving over $200, and all for the price of a book you should buy anyway, even without the incentives!

If you already have the book, why not order it for a friend? What better gift could you give him or her for less than twenty bucks?

Labels: ghost addresses, hide my identity, hide yor identity, how to be invisible, how to protect your privacy, New Mexico LLCs, nominees

An attorney in Washington State made a disastrous error that was not covered when he went to law school. He had a client in his office who was having a dispute about child custody. The attorney turned on his speakerphone and put a call through to the attorney representing the man's wife. Since no one answered, he left a brief message after the beep.

The attorney then continued his conversation with his client, unaware that he had not disconnected the speakerphone. In the conversation that followed, his client admitted that he'd had a tap put on his wife's telephone.

The recording at the far end made its way to the FBI. The result to the lawyer's client was two months in jail, five year's probation, and a $21,138 fine.

And the attorney? Nothing. There are no laws against stupidity. (From How to Be Invisible, St. Martin's Press.)

Labels: how to be invisible, privacy dangers, speakerphones, telephone taps

A certain PI who shall here remain unidentified reports getting the following information about a couple with two teens. It took him less than a week. None of the information came from an informant or from the internet.

The name of the doctor and the information that the man was buying Viagra.
Someone in the family was consuming a lot of cheap whiskey.
The boy was working for minimum wage at a hamburger joint.
The family was behind on their phone bills, due in part to lengthy calls to Guatemala.

So where did the information come from? From their trash. (Once set on the curb, it’s fare game for anyone!) And such items as empty pill bottles, pay check stubs, bank statements, telephone bills, magazines, and want ads that are circled in a newspaper can reveal amazing amounts of information.

As outlined in How to Be Invisible, the first step in going private is to get a shredder. The second step is for every member of the family to use it, 24/7.

Labels: how to be invisible, Shredder, trash

Japan has a registration system for all citizens and foreigners at the local city office. Citizens are registered pen-to-paper on family trees called "koseki". This is the foundation for employment, bank accounts, national health insurance, voting. All of the afore-mentioned activities are cross-checked through the city office.

Separately, foreigners are registered by a photo ID card called "gaikouko-jin-cardo", or in the vernacular, "gaijin card" issued for the duration of their passport stamp. Any changes to a foreigner’s life, for example address, marriage/divorce, job changes are written in ink on the back of the card and pen-to-paper in the city office.

“For Japanese people,” says an American expat living in Japan, “it is impossible to dodge this system. If there is any doubt raised as to your registration, you will find your bank account temporarily inactive, health insurance card not working at the clinic, etc. This happened to me several years ago. I moved and thought I would tell everybody later, as in 30 days or so. I went to the doctor for a check-up and the receptionist asked if I moved recently. I said yes. She wrote down my new address.

"How did she know? My company’s HR staff called me to say that my bank called to confirm my address before my salary could be deposited. My name didn’t match the address on my salary deposit. How did they know? Landlords are expected to inform on tenants who come or go!”

Wait, there’s more!

“Japanese don't use checks,” he says. “Instead, they go to any ATM and type in the recipients name or company name, bank name, account number, and insert cash. A record is then sent to all parties. One’s entire financial life is recorded -- how much the telephone bill is, medical clinics visited, religious contributions, debts paid to loan shark consumer finance companies, etc.”

Compare that to the U.S., where—if you move—by following the instructions in How to Be Invisible you can hide your true home address for the rest of your life. Further, if you follow the instructions in Invisible Money, you can hide your cash payments as well

Labels: hiding home address, how to be invisible, invisible money, Japan, Lack of privacy, secret home address

This information is directed to a young woman who’s just learned that her ex-boyfriend is on the way to her city and he’s carrying handcuffs and duct tape. Although How to Be Invisible details plans to disappear eventually, what is needed at present is to disappear NOW!

Your ex-boyfriend may have illegal access to records normally confined to the police and the government. Assuming this might be the case, here’s what to do:

Remove the battery from your cell phone so that it cannot be tracked. If you can’t get the battery out, then leave it behind or give it away. If you must make a call in regard to some urgent matter, use a pay phone but then leave that area the moment you hang up. Empty your bank account, pawn anything of value, and borrow from your friends. From this point on, do not use a credit, debit, or ATM card.

If you have a car or can borrow one, flee the city and if possible the state. If you have any small items that can be sold later on Craigslist, stuff them in the trunk. Obey all traffic signs and stay within the speed limit. Even if your stalker is a policeman—as some are!—it is unlikely that he would dare put out an all-points bulletin (or BOLO, which stands for "be on the lookout").

From this point on, use only the U.S. mail to communicate with your family and friends. They can reply to you via a new Webmail address provided they enter you in their address books under another name and address you only with that name in each e-mail. You can pick up these messages in a library or an Internet cafe. But now comes the hardest part—finding a place to stay. On the road, avoid all major chains because they demand ID and enter it in their computer databases. Instead, choose a small mom-and-pop motel where they will accept whatever name you give them as long as you pay cash.

When you get to where you are going, either stay with an old friend who is unknown to your stalker or else rent a room from a private party. (Use your “new” name.) Then, and only then, pick up a copy of How to Be Invisible at Barnes & Noble and start planning your future.

Labels: anonymous travel, avoiding a stalker, cell phone tracking, how to be invisible, how to disappear, rent a room