My personal best for finding people was back in the late 1990s.
Three guys were mouthing off in an IRC chat room. Within four minutes, I told them their names, what school they attended, what building they were in, what computers they were sitting at, and asked them what their coach would say of their behavior.
(I must disclose that I didn't notice a fourth guy.)
A few years later, it took a bit longer to find specific software engineer in South Korea named Kim. (Or was it Lee?)
Fortunately, system administrators and end users are a bit wiser these days. Best of all, most schools seem to have discontinued the practice of using students' social security numbers as their student identification numbers.
Then again, there was some guy last year who dared me to do my worst. He changed his tone a couple of minutes later when I told him his name, his home address, and his home phone number and then asked him what kinds of toppings he wanted on the twenty pizzas he was about to order.
Last year, I quoted back to my boss something she'd told the New York
Times fifteen years earlier but had no memory of ever saying.
It is scary to think what someone who knew what they were doing could find.
